Online Holiday Shopping Sales Meet Record
Breaking Expectations
Author: Robert Benson

As the dollar figures pour in and the numbers are tabulated and
with business analysts predicting a record breaking online
holiday shopping season, it appears the projections were right
on target.

Although the final holiday shopping sales figures aren't in
yet, preliminary reports from a wide spectrum of sources point
to online sales that have met expectations and will make
e-tailers, large and small, very satisfied with the results.

According to comScore, the latest "2005 Online Holiday Shopping
Update" reflects that non-travel spending for the first 46 days
of the holiday season (November 1-December 16) totaled 15.86
billion dollars. This represents a 23% increase over the same
period in 2004. In addition, comScore estimates that U.S.
Internet sales will exceed 19 billion dollars (excluding
travel) for the holiday season, an increase of 24% above 2004
sales figures.

What were the best selling days during this online shopping
period? What were the sales for the highly anticipated "Black
Monday"?

The results are in and surprisingly, Monday, November 28 (Black
Monday) ranked ninth in a listing of the top ten non-travel
online holiday shopping spending days among U.S. home, work and
university Internet users for the holiday shopping period of
November 1-December 16, 2005, with online sales estimated at
484 million dollars.

The top selling day? So far, that distinction goes to Monday,
December 12, 2005, with total sales of 556 million dollars. A
close second was Tuesday, December 13, 2005, with sales of 554
million dollars and astonishingly these two days combined
topped 1.1 billion dollars in online retail sales.

Furthermore, according to the latest "Holiday eSpending
Report", (released by Goldman Sachs, Nielsen/Net Ratings and
Harris Interactive), it is estimated that online shoppers spent
18.6 billion dollars during the first six weeks of the 2005
holiday season (October 29-December 9), a 16% increase for U.S.
online spending compared to the same period in 2004.

To summarize, these preliminary reports offer a positive
outlook for e-tailers as the e-commerce industry continues to
evolve and prosper. Internet users are taking advantage of new
web sites, specialty sites and shops, virtual online shopping
malls, niche marketing and the holiday sales figures reflect
this phenomenon.


About The Author: Robert Benson operates
http://www.ezshoppinghere.com a web site devoted to helping
users find unique gifts in unique places with a wide assortment
of merchandise to choose from including home decor,
collectibles, novelties, three stooges memorabilia, apparel,
novelties and more.