Cyber Monday is still on top.
Retailers from Wal-Mart Stores to Amazon started rolling out “cyber” deals at the beginning of last month and kept them going. That led some to wonder if earlier sales would put a dent in Cyber Monday sales.
The Monday after Thanksgiving has been the biggest US online shopping day of the year since 2010.
But shoppers delivered. In fact, shoppers bought online on Monday at the heaviest rate ever, according to research firm comScore.
It said on Tuesday that e-commerce spending rose 18 per cent from last year’s Cyber Monday to US$1.74 billion, making it the top online spending day since comScore began tracking the data in 2001. The figure does not include purchases from mobile devices.
The strong online performance was in contrast to overall spending. Over the four days beginning on Thanksgiving, spending fell an estimated 2.9 per cent to US$57.4 billion, according to the National Retail Federation.
“Any notion that Cyber Monday is declining in importance appears to be completely unfounded,” comScore chairman Gian Fulgoni said.