CNN Money is reporting that Cyber Monday sales were up 14% from last year, which is a good sign for the economy—though how good is unclear the moment. With total Black Friday and Saturday sales up .9%, according to ShopperTrek (via the Chicago Tribune), the 14% jump in online purchases certainly shows that sales are high enough not to cause too much of a panic, in the industry as a whole. The question is how much of the online shopping has permanently replaced in-store shopping. Were Black Friday sales up .5% because the economy was bad, or because people preferred to shop online? This is one of those cases where we’ll know more next year. If in-store shopping returns to a healthier rate of growth (at least 3%, and that’s modest) and online shopping continues to grow at around 14%, it’s a sign that the main factor was the economy. But if online shopping grows by less than 14% (within a few points) next year, we can be sure that people used Cyber Monday to replace Black Friday, not supplement it.
Make no mistake, though—this is good news.
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The big news today for e-tailers is that it’s Cyber Monday. The bad news is that it’s getting harder and harder to make any sense of Black Friday figures. While there was a small increase over last year’s figures (.5%), there are a few variables. On the positive side, that number might have been punished by rain in the Northeast, says Consumerist. (Which could bode well today). On the negative side, it’s possible that in order to keep sales high, large retailers were willing to take a loss, says Hot Air. And it’s likely that such an increase did not pace inflation, meaning there was actually a small loss. But if this really is the low point of the recession—or, at least, the lone Black Friday to fall within the crater caused by the subprime bust, etc.—these numbers shouldn’t be seen as a long-term problem. We were expecting this.
