STATE WIDE–This Cyber Monday may be the biggest Cyber Monday ever. It may also be the biggest single shopping day ever. That could mean a big day for businesses doing e-commerce, whether they are large retail or small businesses.
“Lots of folks think this will be the biggest online shopping day ever-ten, eleven, twelve plus billion dollars, according to some reports,” said Gerry Dick, on Tony Katz and the Morning News. ” In this age of the pandemic, obviously more people are online and doing their shopping online.”
An estimate from Adobe Analytics puts the day worth between $10 billion and $13 billion for online businesses.
That could mean growth of up to 35 percent from last year.
But, that means some businesses are going to suffer, particularly ones that depend upon the other big shopping days.
“Some of the national numbers from Black Friday were shopping down, sales down about 50 percent, which is obviously dramatic, but not surprising, given what we’re facing here with the pandemic,” said Dick.
He said while Black Friday numbers were not what they needed to be, Small Business Saturday may have actually given some businesses a boost.
“This whole message about supporting local and being there for local businesses, I think is resonating more than ever,” said Dick.
But, Dick said he believes businesses have not seen the worst of what the pandemic may do, especially with talk of a “surge upon a surge” in coronavirus numbers, that will likely affect peoples’ willingness to shop in-person over the next three weeks, for the holidays.
“The Christmas, the holiday shopping period for a number of small businesses, this is their year. This is the time of year that really makes their year, so that makes it doubly difficult.”
