Black Month pays off if you have a wide catalogue, margins that can take four weeks of promotions and a list engaged enough to put up with more sends; otherwise a Black Friday concentrated into a few days protects your price, your margin and your domain reputation better. In 2026 Black Friday falls on Friday 27 November and Cyber Monday on Monday 30 November: between Monday 2 and Monday 30 November there are four full weeks. In this article you will find the pros and cons of both routes, what 15 beauty brands we observed actually did, who should stretch the promotion and how to do it without burning your list or tripping over the rule on the lowest price in the previous 30 days.
What is Black Month?
Black Month is a Black Friday stretched across all of November. Instead of a single offer over the Black Friday weekend, the store runs promotions for four weeks: usually a different category or theme each week, with the peak in Black Friday week and the close on Cyber Monday.
It is different from Black Week, which lasts seven days, and from a single promotion that stays the same for a month. A well-run Black Month has a calendar: every week has a reason to write and a reason to buy now, not in ten days.
The reasons many stores choose it are practical:
- orders are spread over several weeks, so the warehouse and customer service work without one single peak;
- you get there before competitors, when inboxes are less crowded;
- you catch people who buy their Christmas gifts early.
The reasons others avoid it are just as concrete, and we will go through them one by one.
Black Month or a concentrated Black Friday: pros and cons
| Aspect | Black Month (all of November) | Concentrated Black Friday (a few days) |
|---|---|---|
| Margin | More days at a reduced price: the discount weighs on a bigger share of the month's sales | The discount applies for a few days only, the rest of November stays at full price |
| List fatigue | Many emails on the same theme: unsubscribe risk grows | Fewer sends, each getting more attention |
| Deliverability | High volumes for weeks, so you need segments and frequency caps | A short peak, easier to prepare for |
| Perception of the discount | A month of offers makes the discounted price feel normal | The offer stays an event |
| Logistics load | Orders spread over four weeks | Concentrated peak between 27 and 30 November |
Two points deserve more space.
Deliverability. Gmail, Yahoo and Outlook watch how many people report your emails as spam: Yahoo says to stay under 0.3%. A whole month of promotional emails to the full list is the fastest way to pass that threshold, because people who are not interested stop ignoring you and start reporting you. If your domain is already weak, we cover it in the article on why emails go to spam.
The perception of the discount. If your customer sees the same cream discounted on 3, 12 and 27 November, they learn one thing: it does not pay to buy from you at full price. It is the risk the research flags for the more promotional American brands: saturation and getting used to discounts.
What 15 beauty brands did in 2024
Our research on the emails sent by 15 beauty brands between October and December 2024 (you can download the full research from this page) contains both routes. A caveat first: we know what the brands sent, not how much they sold. So we can describe the choices, not say which one paid off more. The full examples, with subject lines and discounts, are in the article on the Black Friday emails of 15 beauty brands.
- Brands that start in October. Tatcha sent 31 emails in October, more than the 29 of November: gifts, a 20% sitewide promotion in mid-October, then on 4 November a one-day preview at 25% off and, on 29 November, Black Friday at 25% off again. It is a whole quarter of promotions, held together by a very polished tone.
- Brands that send nothing in October. Charlotte Tilbury: zero emails in October, 5 in November, 5 in December. The first arrives on 17 November, followed by private access to Black Friday Privé, discounts of up to -40% on kits and up to -30% on everything.
- Brands that use an in-between day. On 11 November ClioMakeUp sends "ULTIME ORE Singles’ Day" with a 1+1=3 promotion and a free gift, then the teaser "Sai tenere un segreto?" on 14 November and the password-protected Black Friday Privé on 22 November. Fenty Beauty, Huda Beauty, Kylie Cosmetics, Supergoop, Mulac and Goovi also sent Singles' Day emails.
- Brands that run a real Black Month. Goovi opens November with "Welcome November: -20% su tutto", moves through Singles' Day, a contest, a Secret Black Friday and a 24-hour -40%, and closes on 30 November. Luce Beauty builds its "Green Friday" from 11 to 25 November, with discounts that change almost every day, and returns with -50% on 2 December to close.
- Brands that squeeze into one week. Nabla sends 6 emails in November and opens its "Black Week" on 26 November, with -60% on everything on the 29th.
There is no single rule: brands in the same sector made opposite choices. What the longer calendars have in common is that every email brings something new: a product, a free gift, a name, a deadline.
Who Black Month suits, and who it does not
It makes sense if:
- you have a wide catalogue, which lets you discount different categories in different weeks instead of the same products for a month;
- your margins can take discounts over several weeks, because you mostly sell products with good margins or high turnover;
- your list is large and engaged, and you already write to it regularly through the year;
- your logistics struggle with peaks, and you would rather have 4 weeks of orders than 4 days of chaos;
- you sell gift products that customers happily buy early.
It does not make sense if:
- you are a premium brand that protects its price: in the research the premium family works with private access, gift sets and free gifts, and keeps the price as intact as possible;
- you have few products: discounting the same few for a month devalues exactly the ones that keep you in business;
- your list is small or not used to hearing from you: going from one newsletter a month to two emails a week brings unsubscribes and spam complaints;
- your margins are already thin: -20% for four weeks costs far more than -30% for four days.
There is also a middle road: a November of content and list-building, with the discount only in the last week. It is the choice closest to the four-week plan you will find further down.
How to structure a Black Month without burning your list
If you choose the full month, structure matters more than the discount.
Themed weeks
| 2026 week | Theme | What you offer |
|---|---|---|
| 2-8 November | Opening and waiting list | Content, new arrivals, sign-up for early access; at most one offer on a single category |
| 9-15 November | In-between day | Singles' Day on Wednesday 11: a bundle or a 24-48 hour offer |
| 16-22 November | Early access | Offer reserved for the waiting list and regular customers |
| 23-30 November | Black Friday and Cyber Monday | Public offer, final hours, close |
Singles' Day began in China in the early 1990s among university students and was turned by Alibaba, from 2009, into an online shopping day. It is not a major shopping date in every market, but in the research many beauty brands use it as an excuse for a short offer in mid-November: it is useful precisely because it is not Black Friday.
Different offers for different segments
Not everyone needs to receive everything. Regular customers can get early access and dedicated terms; people who bought once get offers on the categories they already bought; subscribers with no orders get the public offer. People who have not opened in six months get a single email, the Black Friday one, or nothing.
Frequency caps
Decide in advance how many promotional emails each segment can receive per week, and respect the cap even when you are tempted to add "one last email". A practical rule: one or two promotional emails a week in the first three weeks, a few more in Black Friday week for the engaged. Anyone who buys leaves the promotional emails and enters the post-purchase flow.
A new reason for every send
Take your cue from the brands in the research: a name of its own for the event (Green Friday, Black Week, Cyber Craze), a different free gift, a new category, a deadline. Two emails in a row with the same "-20% on everything" are the quickest way to raise unsubscribes.
For the day-by-day sequence of the week from 23 to 30 November, follow the four-week plan for Black Friday emails.
The 30-day rule: what changes for a long promotion
Under Article 6a of Directive 98/6/EC, introduced by the Omnibus directive (Directive (EU) 2019/2161), every announcement of a price reduction must indicate the prior price, meaning the lowest price the trader applied during a period of not less than 30 days before the reduction. Each EU country has turned this into national law, so the exact wording and the edge cases differ from one country to another. In France, for example, it is article L112-1-1 of the Code de la consommation.
In a Black Month this rule weighs more than in a three-day Black Friday, for two reasons.
- October and early November discounts lower the reference. Suppose you sell a cream at 50 euros, discount it to 40 in the second week of November and then put it back to 50. When you offer it at 35 on 27 November, the prior price you must show is 40, not 50. The discount you can advertise is smaller than you thought.
- A continuous campaign with a growing discount has a rule of its own. The directive lets each country provide that, when a price reduction is progressively increased, the prior price is the price before the first reduction was applied (paragraph 5 of Article 6a). Where a country has done so, as France has, a -10% that becomes -20% and then -30% without going back to full price can keep the original price as its reference.
In practice: if you want a Black Month, rotate the categories (different products each week) or run a single continuous campaign on the same products. The riskiest combination is discounting, going back to full price and discounting the same products again. Paragraph 3 and paragraph 4 of the same article let countries set different rules for goods that spoil quickly and a shorter period for products on the market for under 30 days, so for those cases check your country's text or ask an adviser. This section describes EU rules; if you sell outside the EU, the rules may be different.
How to do it with AchillesAI
In AchillesAI a promotion or a timed angle has a precise window: only the abandoned cart emails delivered inside that window mention the promo, while outside it they go back to talking about the product at full price. In a Black Month you can set a window for each week, so every recovery email mentions the right offer without rewriting your flows.
