Seasonal

New York – When it came to fulfilling holiday deliveries, Apple, Dell, Nordstrom and Zappos stood out among other major competitors. According to research from StellaService, all four provided an aggressive guarantee that orders placed by Dec. 23 would be delivered by Christmas and managed to meet that promise in all regions of the U.S.  

New York - The day after Christmas (Dec. 26) posted the highest traffic for online shopping, with 125 points, since the 2014 holiday shopping season began. According to Verizon Retail Index data, year-over-year, traffic attributed to online shopping was on par (125) with the same day in 2013.  

Austin, Texas – Consumers who didn’t get what they wanted for the holidays are taking matters into their own hands. According to new research from digital deals site RetailMeNot, 81% of consumers plan to shop end-of-year sales.   Of these shoppers taking advantage of post-holiday savings, more than half (63%) plan to shop for themselves. Millennials are especially interested in after-Christmas sales, as 92% of respondents 18 to 34 years old said they plan to shop during this time.    

Seattle – It was a very mobile holiday season for Amazon.com. Nearly 60% of Amazon.com customers shopped using a mobile device this holiday.     Mobile shopping accelerated as customers got later into the shopping season. Cyber Monday continues to be Amazon.com’s peak mobile shopping day. On Cyber Monday, Amazon customers worldwide ordered more than 18 toys per second from a mobile device.  

New York - Christmas Day saw both strong online and mobile sales. Key Christmas Day trends reported by the IBM Digital Analytics Benchmark include an 8.3% year-over-year increase in online sales.   In addition, mobile traffic accounted for 57.1% of all online traffic on Christmas Day, an increase of 18.6% from the prior year. Mobile sales accounted for 34.8% of all online sales on Christmas Day, an increase of 20.4% year-over-year.  

New York - Retail sales in the United States increased 5.5% from the day after Thanksgiving through Christmas Eve, fueled by demand for women's apparel, jewelry and dining out, according to MastyerCard Advisors. Spending Pulse holiday report. Consumer electronics, which many industry analysts had predicted would be among the strongest categories this holiday season, was actually among the weakest, according to the report, with sales "basically flat" from Black Friday to Dec. 24 and in negative territory starting on Nov. 1. 

Retailers’ with robust mobile e-commerce capabilities were able to cash in on Christmas Day as sales increased 8.3% compared to the prior year, according to the latest update from IBM’s Digital Analytics Benchmark report.

In addition to the 8.3 percent in online Christmas Day sales, IBM said mobile device traffic increased 18.6 percent to account for 57.1 percent of all Christmas day e-commerce traffic. Mobile sales increased 20.4 percent and accounted for 34.8 percent of all online sales, according to IBM.

Retailers expected online sales to hit record levels in 2014 and did they ever.

New all-time highs for e-commerce sales are now expected for the November through December time frame following a strong surge in sales during the final week before Christmas, according to the digital measurement firm comScore.

Didn’t get your Christmas gifts delivered on time? Don’t blame the major carriers this year, according to a new study from Kurt Salmon.

UPS, FedEx and the U.S. Postal Service held up their end of the bargain this year when it came to delivering packages in time for Christmas, according to an analysis by the consulting firm. However, a troubling 13 percent of last minute e-commerce orders did not reach recipients in time for Christmas versus a 15 percent failure rate last year.

San Jose, Calif. – “Super Saturday,” the Saturday before Christmas (Dec. 20), was not quite super for retailers expecting a sales bonanza. According to data from in-store analytics provider RetailNext, compared to the equivalent date in 2013, net sales were down 9%, store traffic was down 10.6%, total transactions fell 8% and average transaction value was 0.9% lower.   However, there were a couple of bright spots. Conversion rate rose 0.4 percentage points and sales per shopper increased 1.8%.