Amazon postpones Black Friday sales in France amid lockdown uproar

The French arm of American e-commerce giant Amazon has agreed to postpone Black Friday sales by one week, as requested by the government, if it means small businesses can reopen early.

Initially planned for 27 November, Amazon France’s Black Friday promotion will now take place on 4 December. AFP - DENIS CHARLET

Retailers forced to close since France went into its second lockdown on 30 October have been calling for a boycott of Amazon, which has been allowed to continue trading.

In response, Amazon France CEO Frédéric Duval told TV channel TF1 Thursday: "We’ve decided to postpone the date of Black Friday if the government allows physical stores to reopen before December 1."

Initially planned for 27 November, Amazon France’s Black Friday promotion will now take place on 4 December.

Annulation du Black Friday : "Je pense que ce n’est pas forcément le moment où il faut s’arrêter", répond Amazon Francehttps://t.co/HGq8XvdlOC pic.twitter.com/vJTWpRGVd8

— franceinfo (@franceinfo) November 16, 2020

Adding that Amazon is also seeking to support the thousands of French small-to-medium businesses that sell on its platform, Duval told France Info radio Friday the company was “paying attention to what is happening” and “wants to do the right thing”.

He did, however, point out that ordinary promotions happen daily on the Amazon.fr site, which he said accounted for 1 percent of France’s total retail trade.

Economy Minister Bruno Le Maire is to hold a crisis meeting with major retail groups Friday afternoon to “finalise an agreement" on postponing Black Friday.