ONLINE SALES TRAFFIC INCREASES

The Monday after Thanksgiving, when workers return to their offices and speedy Internet connections, has become a big day for online retailers. Traffic this year was up 19% according to Akamai Technologies, a company that helps other companies send content over the Web. At 1:00 p.m. Central, traffic reached 2,145,558 visitors per minute and was still over 2 million at 8:00 p.m. last night.

The online shopping season has been very good, but some companies were not prepared. Wal-Mart's site was down for at least two hours on Black Friday. Wal-Mart said traffic was up 700% when the servers crashed and the company had only expected a 200% increase. Macy's site was down for an hour the same day, but the company claimed it was due to a bad server, not too much traffic.

USA Today
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TRAFFIC DOWN, SALES UP OVER HOLIDAY SHOPPING WEEKEND

The National Retail Foundation estimates that 140 million shoppers hit stores over the "Black Friday Weekend" this year, 5 million fewer than 2005, but the average shopper spent $360.15, up 18.9% over last year. Here are some interesting stats:

• High-ticket electronics sales were the likely reason for the overall 18.9% spending increase this year. 39.5% of men and 27.5% of women bought consumer electronics or computer-related accessories.
• Men outspent women by 38.1% per shopper.
• 49.2% of the men surveyed purchased books, CDs, DVDs, videos or video games compared to only 34.1% of women.
• The most popular item category purchased was clothing or clothing accessories, and books, CDs, DVDs, videos or video games, with 41.4% of shoppers making a purchase from either category.
• As of Sunday, November 26, the average person has completed 35.6% of their holiday shopping, showing no change from last year.
• Only 8.6% of consumers have finished their holiday shopping.

The NRF estimates that overall holiday sales for 2006 will be up 5% over 2005.

The National Retail Foundation Black Friday Weekend Survey
Reuters
WSJ.com