Winter Holidays

Meijer is taking a different approach to Cyber Monday this year.

Instead of online sales, the retailer says it will focus on offering discounts through its digital couponing site: mPerks. For Cyber Monday, the retailer is offering a coupon for 20% off a single item through mPerks on in-store purchases today only.

Few retailers have as much at stake this holiday season as RadioShack which explains why the company made the high risk move of relaunching its Web site just days before the busiest shopping weekend of the year.

The struggling retailer said the redesign of RadioShack.com offers an easier user experience and comes just in time for the holiday season and kicks off a week of free shipping offers on promotionally priced goods.

Cyber Monday may just as well be an official holiday considering  findings of a new study that show how little work actually gets done.

New York - Macy's continues its aggressive social media push with the launch of online video ads on Facebook starting on Thanksgiving evening. The ads are part of the retailer’s Black Friday weekend campaign.   The ads will feature cartoon character SpongeBob SquarePants, who will also appear in the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day parade. They will target women age 21 and over.   

Reston, Va. - For the holiday season-to-date, $17.5 billion has been spent online using desktop computers, an 11% increase versus the corresponding days last year, according to comScore.  Friday, November 21 has been the heaviest online spending day of the season to date at $914 million in desktop spending. Two other individual shopping days (Wednesday, Nov. 12 and Wednesday, Nov. 19) have also surpassed the $900 million threshold.  

By Christopher Birkholm    As the official kick-off of the holiday season approaches, your core online holiday campaigns are all wrapped up and ready for holiday shoppers. This year, it is expected that online consumer spending will rise 16%  over last year to approximately $60 billion, according to the comScore forecast. Desktop commerce is expected to jump nearly 14% while mobile commerce could see an increase of nearly 25%.  

When Macy's kicks off the holiday shopping season with its traditional parade on Thanksgiving Day, the retailer will also be deploying social media to complement its holiday push.

The company earlier this year was one of the first retailers to launch Facebook video ads. On Thursday evening, Macy’s will roll out its next round of video ads, this time to coincide with its Black Friday weekend campaign.

Shopping is going to get a little bit easier for travelers rushing through the Toronto airport this holiday season thanks to Mattel and Walmart Canada.

The retailer and the toy supplier have teamed up to install a Virtual Toy Store at Toronto Pearson International Airport.

The installation features three LCD screens that consumers can personalize and control via a mobile device to browse and shop brands such as Barbie, Hot Wheels, Fisher-Price, Thomas & Friends, Mega Bloks, and Monster High.

Armonk, N.Y. - Online sales were up 18.7% the weekend before Thanksgiving (Nov. 22-23) compared to the same two-day period in 2013. According to IBM Digital Benchmark analysis, mobile traffic accounted for 48.8% of all online traffic, an increase of 24.4% year-over-year.

In addition, mobile sales accounted for 26.6% of all online sales, an increase of 23.9% year-over-year.