Black Friday and CyberMonday…Let the Shopping Frenzy Begin
Tuesday, November 27th, 2007
According to reports from Shoppertrak, the 4am opening times that many retailers advertised last Friday must have worked…racking up $10.3 billion in sales. Up 8% over last year. But 4am! That’s crazy. I hate to shop. Hate it. Hate it. Hate it. Yet I went shopping Friday to pick up a few gifts. At a much more civilized 10am. I may have missed a few of the uber bargains, but also avoided the crazy, walkie-talkie-armed, reindeer antler-headband-wearing mobs who throw punches and elbow their way to their purchase target. There is nothing I want bad enough to risk that insane early morning mob scene.
Hyped nearly as much as Black Friday, Cyber Monday is a media darling. According to ComScore, it racked up $733 million for e-tailers Monday, up 21% from last year. Setting a record for the largest-ever day of online shopping. Interestingly enough, 60% of dollars spent online on Cyber Monday came from work computers, with the balance coming from home and university computers. Probably not a stat that makes employers happy.
BTW:Â Shop.org put together a site called CyberMonday to aggregate information on special offers from hundreds of e-tailers. All of Shop.org’s proceeds from items purchased through CyberMonday.com help support a scholarship fund established to provide financial support to students pursuing careers in the e-commerce industry