Payment merchant Visa Europe revealed it had prepared to process 1,600 transactions a minute yesterday. They expected a rise of 25% on 2008’s figures within the same period by midnight.
Laura Tenison, managing director of childrenswear company JoJo Maman Bébé, has seen traffic to the firm’s website grow markedly over the past 12 years.
Ms Tenison said that not only had the value of orders increased in recent years, but the type of consumers ordering online had also shifted.
“We have had a web presence for the last 12 years and over that time sales have grown and the type of customers we see have changed too,” said the Pontypool-born entrepreneur.
“When we started 99.5% of e-commerce came from men – it was really only the geeks who were on it.
“That figure has gradually changed until it has become in line with the rest of our sales – 98% female.
“As more people get home computers the numbers have changed and the sales we have been getting are consistently high.
“Yesterday was busy and we expect the rest of this week and next to be an incredible time.”
Bosses at Visa said that lunchtime and then again at 7pm were yesterday’s busiest points for internet-based sales, with shoppers keen to purchase goods ahead of the final dates for guaranteed pre- Christmas delivery.
Officials at John Lewis, which on October 22 opened its first Welsh outlet in Cardiff, said that its sales assistants had experienced one of the most hectic weeks of the year.
The chain recently announced that its internet sales had soared between 30% and 40% year-on-year, and had already beaten its online festive sales record before “Cyber Monday”, when workers pick up their final pay packet before December 25.
Its top-selling item was the Nintendo Wii Black console, priced around £159.
But Amazon, which operates a warehouse the size of 11 commercial football pitches from its site on Fabian Way on the outskirts of Swansea, said that its busiest day for sales was likely to fall on December 7 – or even a week later on December 14 as confidence in the retail sector solidified before Christmas.
Ben Howes, a spokesman for amazon.co.uk, said: “For us Monday was not the busiest day of the year. Traditionally in the UK it is the first Monday of December that is busiest, so that will be next week and might even be December 14 as consumer confidence picks up.
“Last year on the equivalent day, December 8, we took orders in the UK for 1.4 million items. A delivery truck left our depots every five minutes and 24 seconds.”
Over the last three decades, since internet shopping began with its first transaction in March, 1981, its popularity among consumers has reached a new high almost every year in a row.
In 2005 market analysts Verdict Research said that an estimated £8.2bn was spent by British shoppers online.
By 2008 the figure had more than tripled and reached a reported £26.5bn. Experts believe that increasingly, technology-savvy consumers feel that better deals can be found on the net.
Others want to slash the number of hours spent pounding the high street. A study by the British Shopping Centre Council discovered that shoppers spend an average of 40 hours choosing and paying for Christmas gifts bought from walk-in stores. But those who buy presents online take just 10 hours.
Ian Geddes, retail consulting partner at Deloitte, said that the rapid rise of internet sales showed the extent that the “digital age had embedded itself into mainstream life”.
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