Online Shoppers Break Records – Again

Single day online retail sales records have been set and broken several times this holiday shopping season, as more people turn to e-tailers to find gifts.

by Kristina Knight

From November 1 through December 15, online shoppers spent $19.48 billion, a 25% increase over 2005 numbers.

Gian Fulgoni, chairman of comScore Networks said in a statement, “The growth rate of online retail spending accelerated during the latter part of last week, with sales on Friday, December 15 growing 38 percent versus the corresponding day last year. This demonstrates consumers’ willingness to rely on retailers’ late-season shipping guarantees.” Many online retailers guaranteed pre-Christmas delivery for orders placed prior to December 18th.

Cyber Monday (November 27th) began the shopping fest, with shoppers spending $608 million online. That record was broken within a week when shoppers spent $647 million on December 4th. Consumers set another single-day shopping record Monday, December 11, spending $661 million (non-travel dollars) online. December 13th, shoppers broke that record, spending $667 million online.

How do those record breaking days add up compared to what some predicted for this holiday shopping season? eMarketer’s Online Holiday Shopping Preview predicted online buyers would spend $24.3 billion overall. That is 22% more than last season. So far, just on the record breaking sales days, U.S. shoppers have spent nearly $3 billion.