2013 shopping season to be the most lucrative to date

This holiday season saw 10 shopping days exceed the $1 billion mark, 5 of those days happened in the last week.

This shopping season was shorter than usual this year, being shortened by 6 days as opposed to 2012. The shorter shopping season did not put a damper on sales, both in physical retail stores and on online retail websites. According to press release by American Internet analytics company comScore, this holiday shopping season saw an average increase of 17% according to last year. This last week alone saw 5 days exceeding $1 billion in Ecommerce sales, showcasing the growing shift to online retail as opposed to their brick-and-mortar counter parts. From November 29^th (Black Friday) until Christmas Eve, 10 separate days surpassed the $1 billion mark, with Cyber-Monday being the most lucrative with a total of $1.73 billion in sales.

With Christmas only a day away many US retailers, in an effort to squeeze in more sales in such a short time frame, have adopted hybrid strategies, with more companies allowing items to be ordered online and be picked up at physical locations. Target, GAP, Wal-Mart, and Macey’s have begun to offer in-store pick-up this season, hoping to bring in more last minute shoppers to their stores.

"There is not a whole lot you can do at the 11th hour, but this is one of the few levers you can pull. If they can convince even 1 percent more customers to come to their stores, that's a big win”, Sucharita Mulpuru, an Ecommerce analyst at Forrester Research, told Reuters on the new Omni-Channel purchasing strategies.

Ecommerce platforms are not letting new hybrid shopping experiences bring down their sales numbers. Amazon is providing same-day shipping until Christmas Eve in select major cities, like New York and Seattle. eBay CEO Chris Sadirakis also stated they are planning on fine tuning their same-day delivery and in store pick up options for next year’s shopping season.

Best-Buy, has taken a slightly different approach this year, and is offering in-store showrooming, offering deals and incentives to customers who purchase through their mobile application from within their stores.

Research shows the amount of stores holiday-shoppers visit on their predetermined shopping days has dropped from 4.5 - 5 stores to 3 - 3.5 stores in the past 6 years, mainly due to the growing popularity of online shopping. More online retailers will probably offer same day delivery and pick up options during next year’s shopping season.

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