Partner Article

Thematic Shopping

Ve Interactive’s Black Friday weekend wrap up: The pressure to consume around Thanksgiving isn’t just turkey anymore. Total US online visits to the Top 500 retail sites on Thanksgiving Day itself this year were up 16 percent from last year, according to Experian and as many as 147 Million people in the US are apparently also planning to hit the shops this weekend, though that’s a decrease from last year’s 152 Million according to the National Retail Federation. However, a survey of retail chief marketing officers by BDO had projected a 3.1 percent increase in sales on Black Friday itself (yesterday) an improvement in last year’s predicted 1.6 percent gain for the same day. There is the assumption that Black Friday sales are always the barometer for the appetite for shopping for the rest of the holiday season, and the NRF are optimistic that this year’s momentum can be sustained, expecting holiday sales to rise 4.1 percent to an estimated $586.1Bn, with online sales expected to gain 12 percent to $96Bn, three times as fast as total sales. All holiday sales are dependent on a combination of the economy, merchandising, execution and even weather in the case of brick and mortar stores, but with plenty of shopping days left, and indeed eight out of ten of the top shopping days falling in December alone, the race both on and offline has now begun… And next in the sequence of thematic shopping days? Cyber Monday. Stay tuned!

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by Kathy Heslop .