News

New York - Ike Boruchow, analyst, Sterne Agee, reviews Black Friday results in the specialty retail sector:    

All systems are go and the holiday season is clear for takeoff at Macy's Herald Square in New York City.

That’s because this year’s Macy’s Christmas window display, “Santa’s Journey to the Stars,” traces the adventures of Alex, a young boy who receives a magical and mystical telescope that allows him to experience the wonder of Christmas on other planets before landing back on Earth at the iconic Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade.

Washington, D.C. - The Alliance for Main Street Fairness (AMSF) launched a television advertising campaign to educate lawmakers on what is says is the imminent threat posed by China's online mega-retailer Alibaba as it enters the U.S. retail market. Retailers are asking the U.S. House of Representatives to join the U.S. Senate by passing e-fairness legislation that closes the online sales tax loophole this year.    

Online and mobile shopping on Thanksgiving Day and Black Friday reached record levels according to a real time analysis conducted by IBM Digital Analytics Benchmark.

Thanksgiving online sales increased 14.3 percent and mobile sales increased 25.4 percent. Black Friday online sales increased 9.5 percent while mobile sales increased 28.2 percent, according to IBM.
 

Pittsburgh - Just more one-third of all Black Friday online revenue came from shoppers on mobile devices, up 48 percent from 2013. According to Branding Brand's sample of 35 North American retailers running on its commerce platform, 90% of these consumers were on Apple devices.   Mobile devices (smartphone and tablets combined) produced a total of almost 2.2 million visits, 48,000 orders, and $5. 54 million in revenue on Black Friday. In addition, mobile devices generated:

New York - Count Walmart as not falling victim to the Black Friday weekend blues. The discounter is reporting a strong holiday  weekend -- including record online sales.  

Just a few weeks after taking over several regional bedding companies, Mattress Firm reported profits of $15.6 million or 45 cents per share, compared to $18.1 million or 53 cents per share for the year-ago quarter. Sales for the third quarter increased 42.3% to $464 million from $326 million a year ago, reflecting same-store sales growth of 8.5%.

Cyber Monday online sales were up 8.7% as of 3 p.m. EST over the same period on Cyber Monday 2013, according to IBM Digital Analytics Benchmark, with mobile traffic accounting for 38.6%  of all online traffic, up 28.8% over last year.   Mobile sales accounted for 21.3% of all online sales on Cyber Monday, an increase of 29.3% year over year.    Here are the key drivers behind the Cyber Monday trends, according to IBM: