comScore Predicts Record Holiday Spending Online

Posted 11/24/2010 at 9:20am | by Paul Lilly

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Here's some good news for e-tailers looking to get back in black. According to market research firm comScore, eCommerce for holiday season to date has totaled $9.01 billion, a 13 percent increase over the same time period one year ago.

"The beginning of the online holiday shopping season has gotten off to an extremely positive start, outperforming our earlier expectations," said comScore chairman, Gian Fulgoni. "Despite continued high unemployment rates and other economic concerns, consumers seem to be more willing to open up their wallets this holiday season than last. While this early spending surge reflects, in part, heavy promotional activity on the part of retailers occurring earlier this season, it is nevertheless a very encouraging sign."

It's also indicative of more spending to come, comScore suggests. The analytics firm predicts holiday spending for the November-to-December period to hit $32.4 billion, an 11 percent gain over last year's numbers. Helping the cause are the free shipping promotions, such as those being offered by Walmart and Best Buy. Some 77 percent of respondents indicated that free shipping is either 'very important' or 'somewhat important' to their purchasing decision.

Get the full scoop here.