Black Friday and Thanksgiving online sales in the US surged to record highs as shoppers bagged deep discounts and bought more on their mobile devices, heralding a promising start to the key holiday season, retail analytics firms said.
US retailers raked in a record US$7.9 billion in online sales on Black Friday and Thanksgiving, up 17.9 percent from a year ago, said Adobe Analytics, which measures transactions at the largest 100 US online retailers, on Saturday.
Adobe said Cyber Monday is expected to drive US$6.6 billion in Internet sales, which would make it the largest US online shopping day in history.
Photo: Reuters
PREPARATION
In the run-up to the holiday weekend, traditional retailers invested heavily in improving their Web sites and bulking up delivery options, preempting a decline in visits to brick-and-mortar stores. Several chains tightened store inventories as well, to ward off any post-holiday liquidation that would weigh on profits.
TVs, laptops, toys and gaming consoles — particularly the PlayStation 4 — were among the most heavily discounted and the biggest sellers, retail analysts and consultants said.
Commerce marketing firm Criteo SA said 40 percent of Black Friday online purchases were made on mobile phones, up from 29 percent last year.
No brick-and-mortar sales data for Thanksgiving or Black Friday were immediately available, but Reuters reporters and industry analysts noted anecdotal signs of muted activity — fewer cars in mall parking lots, shoppers leaving stores without purchases in hand.
Stores offered heavy discounts, creative gimmicks and free gifts to draw bargain hunters out of their homes, but some shoppers said they were just browsing the merchandise, reserving their cash for Internet purchases.
There was little evidence of the delirious shopper frenzy customary of Black Fridays from past years.
However, retail research firm ShopperTrak RCT Corp said store traffic fell less than 1 percent on Black Friday, bucking industry predictions of a sharper decline.
“There has been a significant amount of debate surrounding the shifting importance of brick-and-mortar retail,” ShopperTrak senior director of advisory services Brian Field said. “The fact that shopper visits remained intact on Black Friday illustrates that physical retail is still highly relevant and when done right, it is profitable.”
The National Retail Federation, which had predicted strong holiday sales helped by rising consumer confidence, said on Friday that fair weather across much of the nation had also helped draw shoppers into stores.
The federation, whose overall industry sales data are closely watched each year, is scheduled to release Thanksgiving, Black Friday and Cyber Monday sales numbers today.
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