The UK’s biggest shopping day – and what lies ahead

January 2, 2008
by Latitude

It may be a new year (and a happy one to you, now that I mention it), but we’re not quite done analysing and interpreting the stats from 2007’s online sales. This data is a goldmine of information, and while some of us are probably quite eager to put the holidays behind us now that they are finally over and everyone’s back at work, the holiday season shopping metrics are too revealing to ignore.

Robin Goad, research director of Hitwise UK (who some of you may remember from his enlightening presentation and panel appearance at Latitude’s Client Summit in November), has the goods on the UK’s busiest online shopping day of 2007.

As you can see, not only was Boxing Day the busiest day this year, but it was busier this year than in both 2005 and 2006. Indeed, the importance of the day after Christmas has been increasing steadily over the last two years. Another interesting thing…is the position of the pre-Christmas peak. Last year it moved closer to Christmas as retailers put more effort into ensuring on time delivery and shoppers’ confidence improved. However, this year the peak moved noticeably back – to the last Sunday in November. Maybe online shoppers have become more organized and are choosing to get their Christmas shopping finished before the December panic, something that was previously the preserve of the ultra-organized.

With so many traditional high street retailers revamping their websites in recent months, I was quite intrigued to find out whether it had paid off for them in holiday revenues. According to Robin:

By Boxing Day, the top 50 high street retailers were receiving over twice as many UK Internet visits as their online-only rivals.

Hitwise data shows that Argos, Currys, Comet, Marks & Spencer and Next were the big high street winners on Boxing Day. Robin extrapolates from this that electronics and clothing will be the most popular products in the post-holiday sales.

Another statistic of note comes from the US, where MasterCard reports numbers which may cause undue disappointment without proper context:

Spending from Thanksgiving to Christmas rose just 3.6 percent over last year, the weakest performance in at least four years, according to MasterCard Advisors, a division of the credit card company. By comparison, sales grew 6.6 percent in 2006 and 8.7 percent in 2005.

However, it is important to remember that gift cards are perhaps more popular than ever. This is noteworthy because gift card sales are not actually accounted for until the cards are redeemed. So gift card purchases over the pre-holiday shopping period will not be figured into overall pre-holiday sales figures.

The New York Times piece linked above also highlights a growing trend among shoppers that, in addition to the high petrol prices which are luring people online to spend, spells good fortune for those selling online:

Eboni Jones, 32, of Windsor, Conn., epitomized the problem for stores. A phone company manager, she waited until Christmas Eve to make a single purchase at a major chain store this season, favoring Web retailers and designer outlet stores offering deep bargains

…MasterCard found that online spending rose 22.4 percent, a strong showing, given fears that Web purchases would slow after a decade of impressive growth.

Which just goes to show that, goldmine though this information may be, you can only discern so much from these metrics. Only a fool would obsess over numbers in favour of giving customers the sort of shopping experience – from price and ease of purchase to favourable shipping costs and, yes, robust search – that will keep them spending online. As the triumph of the high street retailers online has demonstrated, investment in the web can pay off massively.