There is almost no question that this holiday retail sales in general will be a comparatively weaker one. Total retail sales, excluding automobiles, rose just 3.6% over the previous year (according to MasterCard SpendingPulse), but factoring out spending on gasoline -- which soared thanks to a 27% average price increase since same time last year -- retail sales increased a lackluster 2.4%. Industry forecasts had predicted gains of 3.5% to. There is a definite trend for the consumer to go after the deal, and I suspect this will continue throught the next 12 months at the minimum. Expect bargain shopping opportunities the next 4-8 weeks.
The bright shots as expected was the e-commerce sector, which posted a 22.4% gain in online sales over last year, according to SpendingPulse. 7.1% gain for the luxury sectors only. Costco reported strong sales of seasonal gifts and food that more than offset weaker-than-expected jewelry sales. E-commerce is chanigng how tradtional Christmas shopping is being done. According to Forrester, on average, Web buyers have spent $511 and $313 in stores and online, respectively, during the past three months. In fact, 53% of Web buyers have spent between $1 and $199 online during the past three months, whereas just 18% of Web buyers fall into that spending bracket for their retail store purchases.
In fact, technology has truly come of age and not just from people shopping online, but there are more tech products like the Wii and the iPhone or iTouch and there's so much technology built into almost anything we guy whether it is a key chain or photo frame. But the preponderance of technology, it's shaping all our lives right now. iPhones, Blackberry, Blue Tooth, XBox, these are all part of the digital dictionary for our generation's x, y and z and are actually shaping not only what we buy and how we buy them. Happy Boxing Day shopping.
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