NEW YORK, Dec. 2 (Xinhua) -- Cyber Weekend e-commerce sales grew 9 percent in the United States this year, up from 6 percent in 2023, while the average discount was 28 percent, down 2 percent from last year, according to data from Salesforce.
"Saturday and Sunday are big online shopping days that are sandwiched between Black Friday, which is the unofficial start of the holiday shopping season, and Cyber Monday," reported Bloomberg News about the development. "U.S. retailers garner about 20 percent of their annual sales during the holiday season."
"Despite the anticipation and careful planning that consumers put into Cyber Week, the discounts haven't quite met expectations this year," Caila Schwartz, director of consumer insights at Salesforce, was quoted as saying. "Nevertheless, shoppers still made a significant number of purchases thus far, demonstrating their resilience and eagerness to capitalize on the season's deals."
Meanwhile, retailers face the grim reality of surcharges in this season of giving. Higher fees being levied by FedEx Corp. and United Parcel Service Inc. are nothing new for peak delivery times, but shipping agents said the frequency and size of add-on hikes this year were unprecedented.
Baseline rates at both carriers will have been jacked up to levels in excess of inflation in four of the past five years, including a planned rate hike for 2025. That will bring the cumulative price increase to nearly 33 percent since 2021, according to Mingshu Bates, chief analytics officer at AFS Logistics, a third-party logistics firm.
