comscore: Strong weekend spending helps online sales exceed expectations

Reston, Va. -- U.S. retail e-commerce spending from desktop computers for the first 45 days of the November-December 2013 holiday season totaled $37.8 billion, according to comScore. For the first time ever, the most recent workweek saw five individual days eclipse $1 billion in spending, led by Green Monday with $1.4 billion.



The week before (Dec. 2 - Dec.6) fell short of that accomplishment when Friday, Dec. 6 missed the $1 billion milestone by just $16 million. Overall there have been ten individual $1 billion days this season, and the most recent week (Dec. 9 - Dec. 15) reached nearly $7.7 billion in desktop spending. Total spending since Thanksgiving has been $19.2 billion, up a healthy 21% versus the same period following Thanksgiving last year.



One of the emerging storylines from the 2013 holiday season is the growth of online retail spending during the weekends, according to comScore. Historically, the work week tends to be when the heaviest online spending happens, in part because people are in front of computer screens for longer periods of time, while the weekends tend to be stronger for brick-and-mortar retail and lighter for online buying. This year, however, exceptionally strong year-over-year growth rates of at least 30% have been seen on each weekend since Thanksgiving, while gains on the weekdays have been between 10-16%.



"One of the most interesting stories we are seeing this holiday season is the explosion in weekend online spending," said comScore chairman Gian Fulgoni. "While we have seen solid growth during the days between Monday and Friday, weekend growth rates have surged to nearly 4x what we're seeing during the work weeks."