An independent contractor from FedEx Corp. unloads packages from a delivery truck on Cyber Monday in New York, USA, on Monday, December 2, 2019.
Michael Nagle | Bloomberg | Getty Images
According to Adobe Analytics, online purchases in the US increased 32.2% during the holiday season of 2020 from 2019, to a total of $ 188.2 billion, as shoppers stayed at home and shopped online during the pandemic.
November ecommerce sales, including Black Friday and Cyber Monday, hit $ 100 billion for the first time, said Adobe, which tracks web transactions from 80 of the top 100 internet retailers in the US. In another first, online spend was more than $ 1 billion per day during the 2020 holiday season and more than $ 2 billion for 50 days, Adobe said.
“In the face of the pandemic, digital has become the primary way for people to connect, work, entertain and shop, ” said Taylor Schreiner, director of Adobe Digital Insights. If the downward measures return, online spending is expected to remain high, at least in early 2021. “
Groceries, appliances and books became hugely popular around the holiday season compared to October, Adobe said, while online toy sales were up 50% from 2019 and the jewelry category was up 66%.
Internet spend during the week from Thanksgiving through Cyber Monday accounted for just 18% of the total season, up from 20% in 2019, Adobe said. As retailers were promoting deals earlier than ever, many Americans started shopping in October in an effort to avoid crowded aisles during the pandemic.
Retailers like Target and Dick’s Sporting Goods that offer curbside and other convenient pickup options for online orders saw even stronger sales during the holiday season, according to a separate analysis from Salesforce. Their digital sales were an average of 49% higher than a year earlier, compared to about 28% growth for retailers that didn’t have a roadside pickup and similar options, Salesforce found.
Shoppers have also been looking for ways to finance their purchases and avoid running out of credit cards. The use of “buy now, pay later” for online orders grew 109% during the holiday season, Salesforce found, with the largest run-up in the last week before Christmas.
Now, the surge in e-commerce activity will translate into record returns, which could prove to be the second biggest headache for retailers in the new year. Salesforce expects $ 330 billion in global online purchases to be returned after the 2020 holiday season, representing approximately 30% of total purchases.
“We expect these new innovations to continue into 2021, with vacation strategies becoming the new standard consumers expect from their favorite retailers and brands,” said Rob Garf, vice president of Industry Strategy for Retail at Salesforce.
Read Adobe Analytics’ full report on the 2020 holiday season here.