Shop Till You Drop by Finance News Bulletin

Published: 28/11/07

With so much financial doom and gloom suspended the festive season, many retailers have been anticipating the slowest December for yearsWe'll be custody a close eye, and reporting back, on how the Christmas sales are determining in Britain But as the whole sub-prime obsession started Stateside, why not measure what's moving on Main StreetThe day after blessing, known as ‘Black' Friday because it's when stores start creation money for the year, traditionally kicks off the seasonal shopping mix up

It's the biggest US retailing daylight hours of the year, and typically accounts for about 5% of all Christmas shoppingAnd despite doubts that the mortgage meltdown and credit chomp would constipate consumers, sales seem to have started better than predictableAmid tales of feverish buying fury, Black Friday's figures were 83% up on last year, said step monitor ShopperTrak

147m shoppers visited US stores over Thanksgiving weekend, according to a National sell Federation (NRF) survey which built-in data from Thursday to Saturday and projections for Sunday Although the NRF estimated sales growth at now 35%, which would represent the worst number for five existence, with consumer expenditure per head dropping, also by 35%

Both retailers and seller investors are looking to see if sales momentum can be maintained with oil prices seemingly heading for $100/barrel, the deepest housing depression for 16 years, rising mortgage defaults and consumer confidence indicators plunging to almost their lowly since 1992And whether volume growth can be achieved without slashing prices sell observer Mastercard Spending Pulses sees Christmas sales up between 4 and 45% against last year, but comments that two years ago sales were climbing by between 7 and 8% on an annualised basis

the past was christened ‘Cyber' Monday by US retailers to mark the start of the online festival shopping season, when consumers register on at work to look for presents they didn't find in the shops over the blessing weekendWeb shopping watcher ComScore Metrics is forecasting that online sales reached $700m the past, up from $608m last year and the heaviest mesh shopping day on recordYet Cyber Monday may not even prove to be the biggest internet trade day at the start of the pre-Christmas run-in Online reduction offers started from Thanksgiving Day onwards and some Cyber Monday sales in progress on Sunday or will extend until Friday

Wal-Mart, Best Buy, house Depot, Macy's, Sears, Staples and Toys "R" Us have all put up special website deals to persuade consumers to button from in-store shopping to online orderingWal-Mart said nowadays that compared with a year before, internet sales climbed more than 60% on Black Friday, on which day overall online visits increased 10% from a year previous, according to research firm Nielsen OnlineComScore Metrics saying online consumer purchases rising 22% on Black Friday and 29% on Thanksgiving daylight hours, and is forecasting a 20% increase in internet sales up to Christmas compared with last yearWith the overall busiest online shopping daylight hours usually falling about 10 existence before Christmas, retailers are watching their internet sales information in particular with bated breath

Next week could be the busiest shopping time of the day, according to online retailer 247electrical, who has monitored online shopping for the past five yearsThe high street may be turning down but the internet is still drawing in the shoppers, says the corporation, who expect a shopping surge in the sprint up to Christmas with the first Monday and Tuesday in December usually being the solid's busiest days of the year247 also believes that Britons are putting off the predictable ‘belt tightening' until 2008, and expects that over £13bn will be exhausted online in the UK during the last three months of the year, nearly double last year's total of around £7bn© patent 1998-2007, The Motley Fool Limited

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