The times, they are a-changin’. Retailers used to gear up for Black Friday. Now Online Retailers Gear Up For Busy ‘Black Monday’:
With the rapid expansion of the Internet, the Monday after Thanksgiving has grown to be the all-important kickoff of the online holiday shopping season. On that day, consumers head back to work — and their computers — ready to shop after the long holiday weekend.Last year, the Monday after Thanksgiving was the peak day for online transactions, according to VeriSign Payment Services, a unit of eBay Inc.’s PayPal that processes electronic payments for about 150,000 online merchants. Some 77% of online retailers said their sales increased noticeably that day, according to a recent survey by e-commerce company Shopzilla Inc. and industry group Shop.org, part of the National Retail Federation, which is calling the day “Cyber Monday.”
Before computers, how did anyone look busy at work?
Throughout the year, Monday is typically the biggest sales day of the week for many online retailers, many of which have expanded their Web sites considerably, so they’re more like online catalogs.Some 30% of online jewelry seller Blue Nile Inc.’s weekly sales happen on Mondays, for example, and then sales taper off as the week goes on, says CEO Mark Vadon. “Our biggest time of the day is right at lunchtime,” he says. “You can almost see the wave as it changes time zones.”