Cyber Monday 50 Times More Green than Black Friday

Earlier this year, we told you all about Black Friday and Cyber Monday, two of the biggest shopping days of the year. Black Friday is the day after Thanksgiving where brick-and-mortar retailers offer deep discounts, while Cyber Monday is the following Monday when online retailers slash prices. While both offer unique benefits, which one is more eco-friendly?

Shopping online is a generally considered a greener way to shop, as you don’t have to drive around all day looking for gifts. In fact, a new report by MindClick SGM and GigaOm claims that shopping at stores on Black Friday is on average 50 times more carbon intensive than buying presents online Cyber Monday. Besides all the driving, the rest of the difference comes mainly from the huge overhead of the stores (heating, lighting, employees etc.).

Those infrastructure-related emissions are so heavy that the study found that even a consumer walking to a store to buy their gifts would have a larger carbon footprint that one that shopped online. Shopping online does involve lots of packaging and transportation (think big trucks and planes), but economies of scale come in to play to mitigate the amount of carbon emitted per gift.

So next year, do some research to see if you will be able to shop exclusively online—the planet will thank you.