Shoppers weren’t afraid to pull out their smartphones to shop on Thanksgiving, to the tune of $1 billion.
Sales online Thanksgiving Day totaled $3.7 billion, up 28 percent from a year ago, Adobe Analytics said in a report. That makes Thursday the fastest-growing day for e-commerce sales in history, added the firm, which tracks transactions from 80 of the top 100 internet retailers. Thursday was also the first day in 2018 to see $1 billion in sales from smartphones, according to Adobe, with shoppers spending 8 percent more online on Thursday compared with a year ago.
With more shoppers browsing sites like Amazon for deals during the holidays, the move is seen as starting to steal some of Black Friday’s thunder, when typically throngs of shoppers head to malls across the U.S.
Online spending is, meanwhile, expected to hit more than $6.4 billion on Black Friday, either matching or exceeding Cyber Monday of 2017, Adobe said. As of 10 a.m. ET Friday, $643 million had already been spent online.
Kohl’s said it had a record day for digital sales on Thanksgiving, with 80 percent of online traffic coming from mobile devices. Walmart and Target also called out strong traffic online, with lots of customers this year opting to use their buy online pick up in store options. Shoppers nearly doubled their click-and-collect orders from Wednesday to Thursday this week, Adobe said.
“Retailers understand that shopping and buying on smartphones is now the norm for consumers, and as a result are delivering better experiences and optimization on mobile devices,” said Taylor Schreiner, director of Adobe Digital Insights.
The National Retail Federation is predicting holiday sales gains — in stores and online — will be better than a five-year average of 3.9 percent. It expects a bump ranging from 4.3 percent to 4.8 percent.