In-Store Holiday Shopping Increases, But Not As Fast as Online Shopping

Online shopping on Black Friday, the day after Thanksgiving, increased 19.6% year-over-year, while in-store shopping that day increased 4.2%, according to Adobe Digital Insights and Fiserv Inc., respectively.

Consumers did not disappoint in early holiday shopping results. Adobe Digital Insights, a unit of San Jose, Calif.-based Adobe Inc., said consumers spent $7.4 billion online on Nov. 29, a 19.6% increase from last year and almost spot on with Adobe’s prediction of $7.5 billion in sales. 

So far for the holiday shopping season, which started Nov. 1 for Adobe, shopping on smart phones, at $26 billion, accounts for 34.5% of online revenue. Tablets, at $3.7 billion, are at 5.1%. Spending on desktop devices, at $42.4 billion, or 60.4%, remained a juggernaut.

Shopping on desktop computers yielded the highest conversion rate, too, at 6.9%. For tablets and smart phones the rates were 4.8% and 2.9%, respectively. 

Black Friday also produced robust growth in shopping for in-store purchases. Fiserv’s Black Friday 2019 SpendTrend Holiday Snapshot from its First Data unit said these sales increased 4.2% over last year. Fiserv did not provide a total for the day.

Fifty-seven percent of the transactions were made with a credit card and 43% with a debit card. Fiserv also tracked mobile-wallet use on Black Friday, finding that sales with this payment method increased 82% from last year. The average ticket for a mobile payment was $47.