Canadian Black Friday Is Worth It, No Standing in the Cold Required

The best Black Friday deals

Generally speaking, the best Black Friday deals are found on electronics, small appliances, toys, fashion, and travel. I’ve seen items that are 30% to 70% off. Some people assume that the sales only apply to items retailers are trying to clear out, but quite often many in-demand products are available. For example, Best Buy has $1,000 off a 75-inch Sony Bravia UHD HDR LED TV. That’s 33% off!

You could even argue that the biggest sales happen around this time of the year. For example, Air Canada Vacations has already announced its Pre-Black Friday sale. You can get up to 40% off seven-night stays in sun destinations, which include Hawaii, Orlando, and Fort Lauderdale. Alternatively, you can get up to 30% off three-night stays within Canada, Las Vegas, and California. These deals end on Nov. 25, 2021, which implies Air Canada Vacations likely has another sale coming on Black Friday.

Many other travel operators are also offering big discounts, so now is the time to book your vacation for the new year. Best of all, most of these deals are available online, so in this age of social distancing and face masks, you don’t need to worry about being in tight, crowded spaces.

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How to find the best deals

With hundreds of retailers offering Black Friday deals, many people have no idea where to start. Trust me, the retailers will find you. Just check your social media feeds or browse websites online. You’ll be hit with ads within seconds from merchants that you regularly frequent.

Another option is to search shopping apps for the deals you’re looking for. Sure, you could go through individual websites or paper flyers to find out what the offers are, but there are easier ways.

Reebee is an app that allows you to browse digital flyers from hundreds of retailers across the country. You can search for your favourite merchants or even look up specific items you’re interested in. This is the quickest way for you to price compare and you can even purchase items directly from the app. While they have a section dedicated to Black Friday right now, you can also search other categories such as groceries, electronics, children, pets and more.

Red Flag Deals is another great online resource to search for deals. What makes them unique is the user forums where people across the country discuss the hottest deals and what they’re most excited about.

Stacking deals on Black Friday

Another appealing aspect of Black Friday is the ability to stack your discounts. Think of this as Canada’s version of Extreme Couponing.

Websites such as Rakuten, Great Canadian Rebates and Shopper Army give you cash back when you shop online. It works like this. First, you create an account with one of the cash back sites. When you’re logged in, you click one of their merchant partners. You’ll be redirected to that retailer where you’ll do your online shopping. Your purchases will be logged and you’ll earn cash back, which gets paid out when you meet a minimum threshold.

But, wait, you can further stack your discounts. Let’s say you want to buy something from Walmart. Rakuten is offering 1% cash back when you go through them. If you then pay for your purchase with your Walmart Rewards World Mastercard, you’d earn an additional 3% in Rewards. That’s a total of 4% you’ll get back on top of the Black Friday discounts.

Using the credit cards you currently have to pay for your Black Friday purchases can pay off since you can earn cash back or travel rewards. It’s even worth considering signing up for a new credit card as some of the welcome bonuses are incredibly generous right now and some cards even have no annual fee. For example, there are some cards that are offering up to 15% cash back as their sign up offer.

That said, when applying for a new credit card, it can take time for it to arrive, so you might miss any Black Friday deals while you wait.

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The deals are just as good as the United States

If you’ve held off because you assumed it wasn’t worth it, it’s time to change your mindset. There’s no need to cross the border to shop, and you can now purchase everything online. There’s no doubt that Black Friday is the biggest shopping day/weekend/week of the year in Canada. The question is, what are you going to buy first?