According to estimates from comScore, U.S. consumers spent over $7.2 billion online from PCs during the five day period from Thanksgiving to Cyber Monday, up 10 percent from $6.5 billion last year. As more consumers chose to shop online retail sales at the point-of-sale declined on Thanksgiving and Black Friday for the second consecutive year. According to estimates from ShopperTrack, brick-and-mortar sales totaled $1.8 billion on Thanksgiving and $10.4 billion on Black Friday, each down about 10 percent from 2014.
Total retail spending in the United States over the five days from Thanksgiving through Cyber Monday increased in 2015, but this growth was driven by online and mobile spending as the brick-and-mortar retail volume fell. More consumers have chosen the convenience of online shopping rather than braving the crowds on this busy holiday shopping weekend, while more consumers abhor and boycott shopping on “Gray Thursday,” the Black Friday sales and savings that start in the evening or late night of Thanksgiving. While ShopperTrak estimates that U.S. consumers spent 10 percent less in-store on Thanksgiving this year ($1.8 billion), comScore estimates that U.S. consumers spent nearly $1.1 billion on Thanksgiving in PC or computer-based eCommerce alone.
Meanwhile PC eCommerce retail spending on Black Friday grew nearly 10 percent this year to $1.66 billion up from $1.51 billion in 2014, according to comScore data. Although ShopperTrak reports that brick-and-mortar retail volume fell 10 percent on Black Friday, it still totaled $11.6 billion for the day, which is about 7 times the desktop eCommerce spending. While the bulk of Black Friday sales still occur at physical retail stores the share of total Black Friday sales occurring online continues to grow as online spending trends upward and in-store spending hits another year of decline. Nearly 16 percent of Black Friday sales occurred online this year, compared to 14 percent last year, 11 percent in 2013 and below 9 percent every year prior.
Consumers spent an additional $2.2 billion in computer-based eCommerce on the Saturday and Sunday following Black Friday, comScore reports. This represents an eight percent increase in the online sales volume over this weekend from last year as over $1 billion in sales were eclipsed on both Saturday and Sunday. This marks the second year in a row online sales on the Saturday after Thanksgiving exceeded $1 billion and includes the first ever billion-dollar shopping day on a Sunday in the United States. Combining these estimates from comScore, consumers spent $4.92 billion online in desktop eCommerce from Thanksgiving through the following Sunday. This is less than one-fourth of what consumers spent over these four days in-store, $20.43 billion according to ShopperTrak, but online spending over this period increased 9 percent from 2014 while in-store spending fell by one-tenth.
With continued growth in online sales on Thanksgiving, Black Friday and the following weekend, another successful Cyber Monday was icing on the cake. According to comScore estimates, PC eCommerce spending reached $2.28 billion, up 12 percent from $2.04 billion last year. For multiple years in a row Cyber Monday has beat its own record as the highest volume online shopping day in the United States. Cyber Monday first past $1 billion milestone in 2010, then reached $2 billion for the first time last year. Only Singles Day (11/11, a popular online shopping day in China) has driven more eCommerce sales in a single day.
Also keep in mind that these figures are PC-based eCommerce only, and mobile eCommerce has increased Black Friday and Cyber Monday sales even more. Preliminary estimates from comScore show a 53 percent increase in mobile commerce spending on Cyber Monday from 2014, reaching $838 million this year. This puts total digital commerce (PC and mobile-based eCommerce) at $3.12 billion on Cyber Monday, a 21 percent increase from 2014.
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