Global online sales up 2% YoY during Cyber Week / 196.7 million Black Friday weekend shoppers / Shopify merchants' revenue up 19% YoY during Black Friday weekend

Plus, DoorDash will reduce its workforce by 6%.

Inside.com Part of   Network November 30, 2022

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Global e-commerce sales rose by 2% YoY during Cyber Week (the period between Thanksgiving to Cyber Monday) to $281B, according to Salesforce. Mobile devices made up 76% of e-commerce traffic during Cyber Week. More: Buy now, pay later (BNPL) orders in the U.S. rose by 5% YoY; however, the average order value declined by 5% YoY, indicating that consumers used BNPL for lower-priced items. General apparel saw an average price discount of 34% during Cyber Week, the most of any product category. Chatbot messages rose by 57% YoY on Black Friday and 53% YoY on Cyber Monday, a sign retailers used automation to address customer inquiries. A link to the Salesforce data is available here.

196.7 million shoppers visited stores during Cyber Week, up from 179 million in 2021, according to the National Retail Federation (NRF). This marked a new record for the five-day period and exceeded the 166.3 million projection that the NRF gave before Cyber Week. More: Holiday sales are projected to be 6%-8% YoY to $942.6B-$960.4B. Average consumer spending over Black Friday was $325, up from $301 in 2021. Multiple retailers, including Walmart and Target, have warned that inflation has caused some consumers to opt for lower-priced items or reduce their spending. The record turnout could be a sign that consumers are adopting a pre-pandemic holiday shopping timeline and doing the bulk of their shopping during Thanksgiving weekend.

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Independent businesses on Shopify saw their sales increase by 19% YoY to a record $7.5B between Black Friday and Cyber Monday. The number of consumers globally that bought items from a Shopify merchant increased by 12% YoY to 52 million. More: The three "top-selling cities" were London, New York, and Los Angeles. The three "top-selling countries" were the U.S., the U.K., and Canada The most popular product categories were apparel & accessories, health & beauty, and home & garden. 73% of Cyber Monday sales occurred on mobile devices, and 27% on mobile desktops Shopify financed 56,000 tons of carbon removal to counteract delivery emissions.

DoorDash laid off 6% (1,250 employees) of its workforce as part of cost-cutting measures. In an internal memo, CEO Tony Xu said the accelerated growth DoorDash experienced during the first two years of the COVID-19 pandemic caused it to overhire. More: Xu said DoorDash's operating expenses "would continue to outgrow" its revenue if the company didn't initiate layoffs. Xu noted that DoorDash's revenue growth has slowed down compared to the past two years. DoorDash's revenue increased by 33% YoY (down from 45% YoY growth in Q3 2021) in Q3 2022 to $1.7B. The company's net loss increased from $101M in Q3 2021 to $296M in Q3 2022. DoorDash's stock is down 62.4% year-to-date, and it has a market cap of $20.7B.

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63% of consumers admitted to "bracketing," up from 58% in 2021 and 40% in 2022, according to a survey by Narvar. "Bracketing" is when consumers simultaneously order the same product in different sizes or colors and only keep one while returning the rest. More: 15% of consumers described "bracketing" as "just how they shop now." $218B worth of online orders were returned last year, a $100B increase from 2020. It can cost retailers $10-$20 to process a return in addition to shipping costs. It's estimated that over 5 billion pounds of returned items are sent to landfills annually. In 2019, the amount of carbon dioxide emissions generated from facilitating online orders was equivalent to 3 million cars.

Kroger CEO Rodney McMullen and Albertsons CEO Vivek Sankaran told lawmakers their proposed merger wouldn't weaken competition. Kroger announced in October its plans to pay $24.6B to acquire Albertsons.  More: McMullen said Kroger would remain the fourth largest grocery chain in the U.S. behind Walmart, Amazon, and Costco if the deal is completed. Both companies told lawmakers they would spend $2.8B to lower prices, increase wages, and enhance Albertsons' locations. Sankaran said neither company would close locations, and the deal would make it easier to compete against Amazon and Walmart. McMullen says the move would expand Kroger's national reach and ruled out layoffs.

QUICK HITS: HubSpot and Brandwatch partnered this year to survey over 1,000 individuals across the U.S. to better understand consumer purchasing habits, thoughts, and behaviors.* A jury found former Iconix Brand CEO Neil Cole committed fraud. Rite Aid has begun piloting a smaller store format. A U.S. appeals court expressed skepticism that former Amazon employee Christian Smalls was terminated due to his race. British apparel chain Primark will bring on 1,000 more employees in Spain as part of a $103.5M investment in the country. Former Luxottica CEO Andrea Guerra will become the new CEO of Prada. Tech innovation is surging in education, finance, health care, and other industries. See what your competitors are building with Crowdbotics.* *This is a sponsored post

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Jigney Pathak is a Business Researcher at Inside who loves technology, finance & sports. He has a Bachelor of Business Administration with a finance specialization & has previously worked at Salesforce. Editor Aaron Crutchfield is based in the high desert of California. Over the last two decades, he has spent time writing and editing at various local newspapers and defense contractors in California. When he's not working, he can often be found looking at the latest memes with his kids or working on his 1962 and 1972 Fords.

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