The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Shoppers heat up phones for biggest Cyber Monday
NEW YORK — Weeks of deals didn’t stop people from going online to shop on the Monday after Thanksgiving.
Cyber Monday was on track to becoming the biggest U.S. online shopping day ever, according to Adobe Analytics, the research arm of software maker Adobe.
By midmorning, $840 million had been spent online, up nearly 17 percent from a year ago. And more people are picking up their phones to shop: Web traffic from mobile devices, including tablets, is expected to top desktop computers for the first time this year, Adobe said.
When Frank Yanover browsed Amazon’s Cyber Monday deals on his phone, he wasn’t looking for anything in particular. But he spent $300 on a Vitamix blender, which he said was a $200 discount.
“I never bought it because it was so expensive,” said Yanover, who is retired and lives in Hollywood, Fla.
Over the holiday weekend, he bought an iPad from Best Buy through his phone and then picked it up at a store. And using his voice-activated Echo, he bought Amazon’s $30 Echo Dot for his bedroom, a $20 discount.
Others seemed to be doing the same. The Echo Dot was the top-selling electronic item on Amazon, followed by the Fire TV. Board games, Fingerlings and Legos were best-sellers in Amazon’s toy section.
At eBay, one $745 Apple MacBook Air was sold every five seconds, the company said. And J.C. Penney said its top-selling items on its website were towels, $25 diamond stud earrings and a Liz Claiborne bag that has a built-in phone charger.
Target and Toys R Us offered 15 percent off most items. Walmart. com tripled the amount of items available on its site from last year. But Amazon was expected to be the big winner over the holiday season, with Bain & Co. expecting the online retailer to capture 50 percent of all online sales growth this year.
The shift to online shopping has been noticeable even before Cyber Monday. At a Toys R Us in Toledo, Ohio, on Friday, the parking lot was about half full. Melissa Wetzel said her Black Friday in-store shopping had been relaxing since she didn’t have to fight the crowds.
“It’s been pretty easy,” she said. “I guess most are shopping online.”
At the Woodbury Common outlets north of New York City, retail expert Craig Johnson said he was impressed by how many people turned out Saturday — though crowds still were not as heavy as in the years before online shopping became such a draw.
“Some stores like Nike had like 100 people in the checkout line,” said Johnson, president of consulting group Customer Growth Partners. “Virtually everyone there was carrying a bag — one or two or three or more.”