2004 ONLINE HOLIDAY RETAIL SPENDING EXCEEDED $22 BILLION, UP 22% FROM PRIOR YEAR REPORTS JUPITERRESEARCH
(New York, NY - February 7, 2005) -- JupiterResearch, a division of Jupitermedia Corporation (Nasdaq: JUPM), today announced in its newly released report, "Holiday 2004 Postmortem: Retain New Customers Through Retail Basics", that online retail spending during the 2004 holiday period (November and December) reached $22.1 billion, an increase of 22% over the 2003 holiday period.
The increase was driven largely by an influx of new online buyers: 17.7 million consumers made an online holiday purchase for the first time in 2004. "The holidays present a great opportunity for retailers to acquire new customers for the long term," said Patti Freeman Evans, retail analyst at JupiterResearch. "Not only were millions of people shopping online for the first time, but three-quarters of consumers bought from a site they had never purchased from before," added Freeman Evans. JupiterResearch projects continued strong growth for online retail, forecasting that 2005 online retail sales will surpass $79 billion, up from $66 billion in 2004.
The JupiterResearch report enumerates the top online retail categories, analyzes the reasons much online purchasing happened later in the season than in years past and recommends tactics retailers can use to influence the many consumers who may purchase late in the season but often begin their research early.
The complete findings of this report are immediately available to JupiterResearch clients online at www.jupiterresearch.com. For more information on the report or JupiterResearch's Retail research service please contact Kieran Kelly, Vice President of Global Sales and Client Service at 1-800-481-1212 or researchsales@jupitermedia.com.
About Jupitermedia Corporation
Jupitermedia Corporation (Nasdaq: JUPM), (www.jupitermedia.com),
headquartered in Darien, CT, is a leading global provider of original information, images, research and events for information technology, business and creative professionals. JupiterWeb, the online media division of Jupitermedia, operates four distinct online networks: internet.com and EarthWeb.com for IT and business professionals; DevX.com for developers; and ClickZ.com for interactive marketers. JupiterWeb properties include more than 150 Web sites and over 150 e-mail newsletters that are viewed by approximately 20 million users and generate over 300 million page views monthly. Jupitermedia also includes: JupiterImages, one of the leading images companies in the world with over 5.0 million images online serving creative professionals with products like Comstock Images, Thinkstock Images, Thinkstock Footage, Photos.com, HemeraImages.com, Ablestock.com, Clipart.com and Animations.com; JupiterResearch, a leading international research advisory organization specializing in business and technology market research in 18 business areas and 14 vertical markets; and JupiterEvents, which produces offline conferences and trade shows focused on IT and business-specific topics, including Search Engine Strategies and Wi-Fi Planet.
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