In context: Early analytics show that holiday shoppers started spending early this season. While Black Friday and Cyber Monday Sales were down, overall numbers are up 12 points. Amazon starting its holiday season on October 4 might have something to do with early spending with it calling the season launch its "best ever."
On Wednesday, Adobe Analytics reported that Black Friday and Cyber Monday sales were down over $100 million from last year---a dip of 1.4 percent---but overall spending was up 12 percent. Amazon's snapshot looks a bit different, claiming that it broke spending records over the holiday weekend.
Amazon's holiday shopping report claims that it had the "biggest kickoff" ever to its holiday shopping season, which began clear back on October 4. The company's early start would explain why Thanksgiving weekend was down, but spending as a whole is up---people were getting their shopping done beforehand.
The online retailing giant attributes the push to having sale prices from October 4 to November 25 (Thanksgiving Day) an average of 14-percent lower than competitors. It also claimed that Black Friday and Cyber Monday broke records but did not specify which ones or give any concrete sales figures.
Amazon did say that its top-selling categories this year were Home, Toys, and Apparel. Its top-five single-item sales were Apple Airpods, Revlon's One-Step Hair Dryer, Fire TV Stick with Alexa Voice Remote, Echo Dot (3rd Gen), and Echo Show 5 (2nd Gen). Even though Amazon had three of the top-five most-purchased items, it says over half of its weekend sales went to independent vendors.
Amazon is quick to note that the sales didn't end with Cyber Monday and plans to continue beating the competition throughout the entire holiday shopping season. It says that new deals on a broad number of "giftable" products will be dropping daily. Those who did not already finish their Christmas shopping can find bargains every day on the Amazon Deals webpage.