Success for Online Retailers Over Christmas

Online, January 9, 2014 (Newswire.com) - If recent reports are anything to go by then the festive period was extremely successful for online retailers, but in-store sales continued to dip over December. Physical footfall in stores on Boxing Day declined, dropping 7.6% compared to last year, whilst for online retailers Boxing Day was their busiest trading day of the year and 29% of all orders placed were made from a tablet.

Several high-street chains are also reported to have broken sales records this Christmas. John Lewis sales were up 7.2% on last year figures and the retailer took Ј35.6m on the first day of its December sale, the most money it has ever taken during a single day. Andy Street, Managing Director of John Lewis, believes the emphasis on their marketing activity had a big impact on their success during this period. The introduction of their new loyalty-card scheme in October and their charming 'Bear and Hare' TV commercial have been very well-received by customers.

House of Fraser also reported success. Like-for-like sales for the last 3 weeks of December rose by 7.3%, and the store recorded a 57.7% increase in online transactions. Amazon sales peaked over the holidays too, selling an astonishing 426 items per second. The Christmas period was a further success for Amazon Prime, the online retailers annual membership programme offering unlimited 2-day shipping on items. Over 1 million users signed up to Prime, and on the busiest shipping day more Prime items where sent than ever before.

If these financial results demonstrate anything it is the increasing influence of mobile commerce. The growing number of tablet users is also expected to rise steadily this year thanks to the introduction of several affordable alternatives from Tesco and Argos, and retailers are expected to place a heavier emphasis on their mobile strategy across the coming year.

But not everyone has been able to report tales of equal success. Sainsbury's festive sales are expected to fall by 1 percent over the holidays, despite the big marketing push from their well-received 'Christmas in a Day' campaign. The 50 minute movie took more than a year to create, and was the central part of the supermarket's Christmas marketing campaign. Despite receiving over 1 million views on YouTube the campaign doesn't seem to have made quite such a positive impact on sales. It just goes to show that in certain cases a well-received marketing campaign is not enough to drive sales by itself. Rival supermarket chains Tesco and Morrisons also reported losses over the 6 weeks to January 4th. Morrisons saw sales drop 5.6% over Christmas, and Tesco dropped 2.4% despite a good performance online.