adminRecent analysis of Thanksgiving Day through Cyber Monday card transaction data shows credit and debit cardholders are increasingly completing their holiday shopping online and spending more money on experiences, according to CO-OP Financial Services.
This year, 27.5 percent of credit card transactions processed by CO-OP came from electronic environments, compared to 25.0 percent in 2017. Debit transactions that came from electronic environments similarly increased by 2.2 percentage points (from 14.8 percent to 16.6 percent). These numbers are in alignment with a Nov. 24 report by Adobe Analytics, which revealed Black Friday 2018 was the first day in history to see more than $2 billion in sales from smartphones.
The data shows cardholders tend to spend more per transaction when shopping online. In 2018, the average electronic transaction made with a credit card was approximately $100. In-person credit transactions, on the other hand, averaged $77.84, while debit displayed similar results with electronic transaction averages at $54.80 and in-person averages at $40.70.
The average amount of money spent per cardholder was also up this year, and in some cases, significantly. Credit cardholders spent an average of $292 over the five-day period, up almost 20 percent over last year’s average of $246. For their part, debit cardholders spent an average of $210 from Thanksgiving Day through Cyber Monday. That’s an increase of 11 percent over the same period in 2017.
Black Friday was the biggest shopping day across both card types in terms of total spend, followed by Cyber Monday among credit card users and Small Business Saturday among debit card users.
Other interesting study results from Deloitte indicate consumers have increased their budget for experiences over the last five years. In 2018, experiences represent 40 percent of the planned holiday budget. And, PwC predicted consumers will spend more than 50 percent of their holiday budget on travel and entertainment, including hosting families in their homes and coordinating trips to celebrate with relatives.
