Member Article

Consumers to spend £320m on Christmas "Mega Monday"

Retailers were set to experience a surge of demand on Monday, as consumers ramped up their christmas shopping efforts in the first week of December.

Shoppers were expected to spend £320m with Visa cards online, while 6.8 million transactions were expected to be made.

Trends in UK consumer spending have been flat so far in the run up to the festive season, and commentators have dubbed the first weekday after November’s pay packet “Mega Monday”, with expectations of a significant retail spike.

The Christmas spending tracker released by Visa Europe found that spending was down 3.7% year-on-year in the week commencing 19th November, which averaged out as a 0.8% decline over four weeks. Visa’s tracker is a strong indicator of consumer spending in the UK, as £1 in every £3 is spent using a Visa card.

Commercial Director for Visa Europe, Dr Steve Perry, commented: “Data from Visa’s Weekly Christmas Spending Tracker indicate that consumer spend in the UK is flat, meaning that retailers online and on the High Street are going to have to work hard to extract the same level of spend as last year.

“Hard-pressed consumers are evidently looking for ways to make their money go further this Christmas.

“This is why we expect a record number of shoppers to seek out bargains and offers online on Monday 3rd December, the UK’s Mega Monday.”

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by Miranda Dobson .