Dive Brief:

• H&M stores will not be open for Thanksgiving in the U.S., the retailer announced Tuesday, the first time it will be closing for the holiday. 

• Best Buy and Kohl’s also announced Tuesday that they will open Thanksgiving evening, at 5 p.m. and 6 p.m., respectively.

• H&M said that its decision was made after its recent recruitment campaign went live, saying that it wanted to allow "our store teams to enjoy this time with their families and friends." 

Dive Insight:

These moves may be a sign that, overall, Thanksgiving is not a crucial day for H&M’s brick-and-mortar stores, but may be more important for more general merchandise stores.

H&M’s announcement is part of an overall trend to scale back the Black Friday frenzy, after it ramped up and spilled into Thanksgiving in recent years. This year, Staples, Costco, and others won’t be open, while REI for the first time won’t even open on Black Friday. Target, Macy’s, and Wal-Mart are opening the evening of Thanksgiving.

There are really two basic reasons, aside from consideration for employees, that retailers would forgo being open on the holiday. One is that, although some research has found Thanksgiving Day sales rising, most of them are e-commerce sales. 

Beyond that, though, last year's Thanksgiving Day spending, dollar for dollar, both on and offline fell more than 10% by some estimates, (though, by other measures, sales were up). And studies have consistently shown that retailers don’t really increase their Black Friday take by adding in Thursday, but merely spread it more thinly across the weekend.

Plus, yet another survey has found that shoppers don’t really love shopping on Black Friday or Thanksgiving, and are skeptical that those days hold the best deals. While many shoppers say they’re against stores opening on the holiday, others do shop then. Target has actually said that shopping there is a legit Thanksgiving “tradition.”

These different sentiments may be creating the slapstick-like whack-a-mole game of retailers opening and closing their doors for the Thanksgiving holiday.