Tag: Douglas

Black Friday 2025 Germany: Full Analysis of Discount Trends and Brand Search Visibility Across Key Categories
Black Friday 2025 solidified its position as a major retail event in the German market. German consumers demonstrated an average Black Friday budget of €317, the highest among select European countries.

The German market, however, exhibited unique consumer behavior patterns during Black Friday 2025. Rather than meticulous planning, 59% of German shoppers allowed deals to inspire their purchases, compared to just 32% who shopped with predetermined lists and budgets. This spontaneous yet budget-conscious approach distinguishes German consumers from other markets, where FOMO-driven purchasing tends to dominate.

Against this backdrop of rational deal-seeking and regional diversity, how did retailers and brands perform across key categories this Black Friday?

At DataWeave, we conducted a comprehensive analysis of Black Friday 2025 discounting trends across five major categories in the German market: Consumer Electronics, Home & Furniture, Health & Beauty, Grocery, and Apparel. Our AI-powered pricing intelligence platform monitored over 16,000+ SKUs across leading German retailers like Amazon, Aldi, Douglas, Nutritienda, Carethy, Bofrost, and more, revealing fascinating patterns in how retailers and brands approached this year’s sale season.

Our Methodology

For this analysis, DataWeave monitored average discounts across leading German retailers during two distinct periods:
- Pre-Black Friday: November 6 – November 23, 2025 – capturing early holiday deals and baseline pricing
- Additional Discounts During Black Friday Week: November 24 – December 1, 2025 – covering Thanksgiving week through Black Friday (November 28) and Cyber Monday (December 1)
Our sample encompassed the top-ranked products across subcategories on major retail sites. We also analyzed Share of Search data, which measures brand visibility by monitoring which brand names appear in the top 20 search results for critical keywords.

Black Friday 2025 Germany: The Big Picture

Our analysis covered 16,653 SKUs across five major categories. Here’s the snapshot of average discounts during the Pre-Black Friday period compared to Black Friday Week:

Key Insight: The German market presented a notably different discounting pattern compared to other markets. Pre-Black Friday discounts averaged 7% across all categories, with Black Friday Week adding 5.1% on average. Unlike the UK and US markets where retailers front-loaded promotions heavily, German retailers took a more balanced approach, with several categories actually seeing higher discounts during the main Black Friday Week.

Beauty led pre-sale discounts at 10%, followed by Electronics at 9.3%. Consumer electronics stood out with the highest Black Friday Week discounts at 9.4%, slightly exceeding even the pre-sale period at 9.3%.

Shopping Behavior Patterns: The relatively modest discount levels reflect the rational, value-oriented approach of German consumers. With the majority of shoppers setting budgets between €100-€299 and prioritizing wish fulfillment over impulse purchases, German retailers focused on strategic discounting rather than aggressive margin erosion.

Consumer Electronics

Consumer electronics dominated German Black Friday interest, with 77% of German shoppers most interested in electronics deals, making it the most anticipated category during the sales period. Our analysis of 2,077 SKUs reveals how discounts varied across subcategories and which brands dominated search visibility in this highly competitive category.

Subcategory Discount Analysis

This was one of the few categories where Black Friday Week discounts matched or exceeded pre-sale levels. Wearables led pre-sale discounting at 16.3%, followed closely by Audio & Video at 15.8%. During Black Friday Week, these categories saw additional discounts of 12.2% and 12.4% respectively.

The standout performer was Home Automation, which nearly doubled its additional discount from 7.2% to 13.9% during Black Friday Week. Mobile Devices saw additional discounts dropping from 13.4% pre-sale to 7.1% during Black Friday Week. Meanwhile Gaming doubled additional discounting from 2.1% to 4.3%.

Share of Search: Brand Visibility Trends

Our Share of Search analysis reveals significant shifts in brand visibility during Black Friday Week:

HP saw the highest share of search across Black Friday at 10.5% pre event and 11.6% during the event. Apple led with a 4.7% increase in visibility, jumping from 1.6% to 6.3%. Asus followed at 4.6%. Motorola surged 3.6 %, while wearables brand Fitbit gained 1.7%.

In stark contrast, Logitech dropped by 7.8 %, Beats fell 6.2 %, and SanDisk declined 5.5 %. Computer manufacturers Dell and Acer also struggled, falling 2.5 and 2.3 % respectively.

Home & Furniture

The Home & Furniture category in Germany showed unique discounting behavior compared to other markets, with additional Black Friday Week discounts (6.7%) actually exceeding Pre-Black Friday levels (6.1%). Our analysis of 1,403 SKUs shows how discounts were distributed across subcategories.

Subcategory Discount Analysis

Kitchenware led pre-sale discounts at 8.7%. Decor surged from 5% to 7.5%, lighting jumped from 5% to 6.9%, and bedding more than doubled from 3.2% to 6.6%. These substantial increases suggest strategic timing to capture consumer attention during peak shopping days.

Share of Search: Brand Visibility Trends

Mattress brand Slumber Solutions saw the highest share of search at 21.8% pre event and 26.1% during Black Friday week. Meanwhile, another mattress brand Swedrea led all brands with a remarkable 10.8% surge in visibility, jumping from 8.8% to 19.6%. Budget-friendly furniture brand Clickbin gained 9.2%, while window treatment brand Sun Zero increased 9% and home textiles brand Safavieh surged 8.6%.

Premium and established brands also performed well: Caraway Home (cookware) rose 6.6%, mattress brand Serta gained 5.3%, and Slumber Solutions added 4.4%. Royal Gourmet, specializing in outdoor cooking equipment, gained 2.0%.

However, several mid-tier brands faced steep declines. Addison Rugs dropped 6.9% from 8.5% to just 1.6%, while Sunlifer fell 6.8 % and Maxax declined 6.4 %.

Health & Beauty

Our analysis of 6,474 SKUs reveals subcategory-level insights and dramatic brand visibility shifts that highlight the evolving German beauty landscape.

Subcategory Discount Analysis

Pre-Black Friday discounts averaged 10%, with Black Friday Week adding 4.5% on average. Fragrance led pre-sale discounting at 11.6%, positioning perfumes and colognes as attractive early holiday purchases. However, Fragrance saw the smallest Black Friday Week addition at just 2.8%.

Hair Care and Skincare both showed strong performance across both periods, with Hair Care at 11.1% pre-sale and 4.9% during Black Friday Week, while Skincare registered 10.9% and 5.1% respectively. Skincare’s 5.1% Black Friday Week discount was the highest in the category.

Men’s Grooming stood apart with notably lower discounts at 3.3% pre-sale and 2.6% during Black Friday Week, suggesting either tighter margins in this subcategory or strategic positioning at different price points.

Share of Search: Brand Visibility Trends

L’Oréal Deutschland GmbH emerged as the most visible brand, surging from 37.7% to 51.9%, (+14.2). German pharmaceutical cosmetics company Medicos Kosmetik GmbH & Co. KG gained 4.4 %. Clinique gained 3.3 %, and French luxury brand Sisley added 3.1 %, German natural cosmetics brand Weleda rose 2.7 %, and Japanese prestige brand Shiseido gained 2.5 %.

The flip side? K-beauty brands and some international names faced significant challenges. Viral make-up brand Tirtir experienced the steepest decline visibility, dropping by 9.2 %. Aveda fell 6.2 %, Elizabeth Arden dropped 5.8 %, and Beauty of Joseon declined 3.8 %. German pharmacy brand Mi.to. Pharm GmbH lost 4.3 %, while Israeli makeup brand GA-DE fell 3.3 %.

The data reveals a clear German preference for European beauty heritage, pharmaceutical-grade cosmetics, and established prestige brands during Black Friday, rather than trendy K-beauty products or mid-tier international brands.

Grocery

While Grocery typically sees more modest discounts compared to discretionary categories, the German market showed interesting patterns with Black Friday Week discounts (3.5%) actually exceeding Pre-Black Friday levels (2.6%). Our analysis of 4,378 SKUs shows how German retailers approached promotions across essential and indulgent subcategories.

Subcategory Discount Analysis

Pre-Black Friday discounts averaged just 2.6% in grocery. But Black Friday Week saw this surging to 3.5%, an increase that represents the highest proportional jump among all categories.

Pet Products and Household Essentials led discounting, with Pet Products at 4.6% pre-sale and an additional 5.5% during Black Friday Week. Meanwhile Household Essentials registered 4.9% and 5.4% respectively.

Beverages showed particularly strong Black Friday Week performance, jumping from 3.3% to 5.3%, while snacks doubled from 1.7% to 3.4%. Fresh categories maintained minimal promotional activity consistent with perishable inventory constraints: Meat & Seafood saw negligible discounts (0.6% pre-sale, 0.4% Black Friday Week), while Fresh Produce actually decreased from 2.4% to 2% during the main event.

Share of Search: Brand Visibility Trends

365 by Whole Foods saw the highest share of search at 9% pre event and 12% during Black Friday week. But Sprite led all brands with a 5.1% surge in share of search. Meanwhile, sister brand Coca-Cola experienced one of the steepest declines in our analysis, with visibility plummeting from 6.0% to just 0.1%. Fanta maintained modest search growth at 0.5 %. This stark divergence between two brands from the same parent company suggests vastly different promotional strategies during Black Friday Week.

Specialty and organic food brands performed well: Amy’s (organic/natural foods) gained 3.6 %, while spice brand McCormick surged 3.1 %. Pet food brand Nutro gained 1.7 %, while value-oriented Great Value added 0.8 %.

Snack brand Planters gained 0.4 %. On the decline side, Organic Valley dropped 2.8 %, Kraft Mac & Cheese fell 2.4 %, and Swanson’s declined 1.1 %.

Apparel

Apparel in the German market showed modest promotional activity compared to other markets, with Pre-Black Friday discounts averaging 5.9% and Black Friday Week at 5.2%. Our analysis of 2,321 SKUs reveals interesting patterns across fashion segments in the German market.

Subcategory Discount Analysis

Footwear dominated discounting in both periods, with an impressive 23.3% pre-sale discount, and 15% additional discount during Black Friday Week. Men’s Clothing followed at 12.5% pre-sale, with additional 7.5% during Black Friday Week.

Activewear presented a unique pattern, with discounts increasing from 7.2% pre-event to additional 9.1% during Black Friday Week: one of the few subcategories to show higher discounts during the main event. Plus Size Clothing saw minimal promotional activity at 0.5% pre-sale and 0.7% during Black Friday Week, the lowest discounts in the entire category.

Share of Search: Brand Visibility Trends

Danish fashion brand Jack & Jones experienced an unprecedented surge with a staggering 19.4% gain in visibility. Sister brand Vero Moda (also owned by Jack & Jones’ parent company Bestseller) maintained flat visibility at 7.1%. Footwear brand Chaoren gained 7%. Meanwhile activewear giant Under Armour rose by 5%.

However, established sportswear giants suffered dramatic visibility losses. Adidas experienced an 11.6% decline in share of search. Dream Pairs saw visibility drop by 10.2%, Puma fell 8.4%, and plus-size brand Just My Size declined by 3.8 %.

Want to understand how DataWeave’s pricing intelligence platform can help your business make data-driven decisions during peak sales events? Contact us to learn more about competitive insights, price intelligence, assortment analytics, content analytics, and digital shelf analytics.

Check out our analysis on Black Friday Pricing and Discount trends in the USA and UK. Follow our blog for more insights on retail pricing trends, brand visibility analysis, and data-driven commerce intelligence.
December 16, 2025
“The Rise of Digitally Native Brands (DNVB)”

Direct-to-Consumer (D2C), Digitally Native Vertical Brands (DNVB), and brand.com serve as
different variations of a similar concept that has blown up in the past few years fueled by factors ranging from a surge in online shopping, stay-at-home restrictions brought about by the pandemic, and a general shift in consumer behavior.

D2C sales were forecasted to account for $17.75 billion of total e-commerce sales in 2020, up 24.3% from the previous year, according to eMarketer. The Middle East might have been late in joining the party but the key players from across the board including brands that sold the traditional way via wholesalers and retailers or those that use online marketplaces such as Amazon and Noon, and the new brands entering this nascent market today are all realizing the potentials of communicating with and selling to customers directly.

The Middle East has one of the highest youth populations in the world with more than 28% of the residents aged between 14 and 29. This means that a great chunk of the population is inherently digital natives, who grew up with smartphones. These young tech-savvy consumers are more informed, are massively influenced by social media for their purchases, are more value and purpose-driven compared to the older generations, as a result of which are open to experimenting with newer brands that align with their ideas and ideologies.

This presents an opportunity for both traditional retailers as well as nascent brands to tap into their e-commerce potential and tailor their offerings to this new cohort of customers leveraging data to understand their individual needs by connecting and engaging with their customers. And the best way to “pivot” to the ever-evolving demands would be by adopting the D2C approach.

Some of the benefits of the D2C milieu in retail would be:

Access to Customer Data

1. Complete access to customer data

Many retailers agree that data is the real differentiator in D2C retail. Using marketplaces like noon.com and Amazon to retail products is great because of the large customer base they have access to, but the downside is, these behemoth marketplaces own the customers and hence their data. The importance of data can’t be stressed enough, but a key use case of all that complex algorithm is that it empowers retailers to customize and personalize offerings to their customers. According to a study by InstaPage, 74% of customers feel frustrated when website content is not personalised. Not having control or access means, they are now crippled from the ‘ability to customize’.

2. Building direct connections with customers

Building direct connections with customers

Trust is a strong consideration for most consumers today. According to a PWC report, 60% of consumers in the Middle East shop online with companies they feel they can trust Gaining trust has proven to be an arduous task for retailers, who now must assure security and demonstrate high levels of education and awareness of their customers, which can only happen through direct connections, personal interactions, and consistent engagement. D2C brands are much better placed to respond to consumer demand to meet their expectations and more importantly address and resolve any grievances they might have.

3. Increasing margins by cutting out middlemen

Increasing margins by cutting out middlemen

Studies have shown that successful D2C companies have a gross margin of 50 – 85%, thanks to two components – effective customer acquisition and eliminating middlemen. Brands with their own unique value proposition, voice, channels and strategies come across as more authentic, and for the millennials and Gen Z, authenticity is the name of the game. Secondly, and perhaps more evidently, getting rid of distribution partners ends up saving costs for the company tremendously.

Also, e-commerce eliminates the high fixed distribution costs brands used to pay retailers for shelf space and replaces it with variable costs to list on their website or an e-commerce marketplace. However, one thing to keep in mind when listing on marketplaces is that digital channels provide transparency into pricing. And customers will be comparing the prices of your products against your competitors. That’s why it’s critical for D2C brands to benchmark their pricing strategies against their rivals to drive more revenue and margins by pricing products competitively. Want to know how? Read about how DataWeave’s AI-Powered e-commerce analytics solutions can help

4. Enables to expand presence

Enables to expand presence

While the D2C approach is proving to be profitable, it also gives brands the flexibility to expand and enhance their presence. Nike would be a prime example of how it has aggressively expanded its presence offline and online since it announced a decade back about its Customer Direct Acceleration strategy. Over the years, Nike’s D2C sales have grown from 16% of the brand’s total revenue to 35% or $12.4 billion by the end of fiscal 2020. Undoubtedly, Nike’s e-commerce focus has been strong, but what they have also mastered is its digitally integrated concept stores that have taken in-store experience to the next level. Moreover, going the D2C way has given the brand more flexibility to build on its voice and purpose, which is reflected across all of its channels and touchpoints. As a result, Nike has been able to grow its presence in existing markets, and establish the brand in new markets by widening its e-commerce penetration and opening stores that helps build communities and serve as marketing fronts instead of merely being points of sale.

In the Middle East too, there are some strong players, that realized the benefits of D2C and are reaping the benefits now. The most prominent of them would be Huda Beauty, founded by makeup artist turned billionaire entrepreneur Huda Kattan. Beginning as a blog in 2010, Huda Beauty has fast become the number one beauty Instagram account in the world. Huda launched her brand into Sephora in the Dubai Mall in 2013 and has since expanded the range to include a vast array of beauty products. The brand has since had several record-breaking launches globally, with products now available worldwide on hudabeauty.com as well as retailers including, Sephora, Sephora in JC Penney, Harrods, Selfridges, and Cult Beauty. Equipped with a clear value proposition and an army of loyal customers, the company continues to grow as its founder continues to deliver on the brand promise and remains connected with her customers bypassing middlemen.

Also read how DataWeave helped Douglas, a premium beauty retailer in Germany go D2C when the pandemic forced them to focus on their ‘Digital First’ strategy.

Another example would be the popular eyewear brand, Warby Parker, a company that capitalized on technology, data, and strived to bring a solution to the market. It stepped into an industry that was criticized for being expensive, entered a market that was skeptical of purchasing online, and turned the whole situation around by going D2C. They designed their own frames and sourced their own raw materials, drastically bringing down the costs that would have been passed on to end consumers. They introduced virtual try-on that delivered accurate results turning customers into loyal consumers. And today, after six separate rounds of fundraising, the company is reportedly set to launch an Initial Public Offering this year.

The playing field in the Middle East is wide open and the appetite for brands that respect value, put people over profits, care about providing suitable, cruelty-free, and ethical products, and understand their customers is only growing. Brands with a robust infrastructure, the right technical know-how and technologies, expertise to manage data, and clear strategies are already on the right path to establishing a strong D2C platform.

Insights from DataWeave can help D2C brands make smart, competitive assortment, promotion, and pricing decisions amongst other things to improve the customer experience and drive e-commerce sales. Sign up for a demo with our team to know more.

August 24, 2021