SpendingPulse provides 2008 summary results for the holiday shopping season

SpendingPulse is known for its macro-economic retail reports and sales services came up with 2008 Midseason update. And according to Michael McNamara, Vice President of SpendingPulse, recent summary gave some good news. Firstly, it is relative strength in eCommerce sales. Also the significant rises are observed in generalmerchandise sector and in gasolinepumping. The latter depends on the dramatic fall in the price per gallon. He noted that in spite of an increase in store traffic several sectors still face a challenging environment even after the Black Friday lift. 
In its research SpendingPulse analyzed the Electronics, Specialty, eCommerce and Luxury sectors. And the results were not sudden. Almost all categories had been experiencing negative growth throughout the fall.

eCommerce sales show better results year –over-year compared to other areas of retail. eCommerce sales declined by only 4.8% compared to November through the first week of December 2007, a sign of relative strength compared to other retail sectors. 

Overall specialty apparel was down 19.5% through the first week of December from last year, comparable to the decline of 19% in the first half of November. 

Electronics and appliance sales continued to show steep declines with a drop of 25% compared to the first week of December 2007. 

Like electronics, the luxury sales category is pegged to high ticket-pricepurchases, and like electronics, luxury showed a particularly sharp declining sale, dropping 27.8% through the first week in December, with a 33%decline for the week after Black Friday. Mr. McNamara noted that historically the Luxury category has relied on the last 10 days before Christmas for much of the holiday sales.