Following the end of the August bank holiday weekend, new research found that Monday was the most popular shopping day of this past weekend for UK consumers.
In fact, online sales rose by 3 per cent year-on-year on Bank Holiday Monday, with 757,308 purchases being made this year with 735,907 purchases made on the same day in 2016. The most amount of online purchases, over the entire weekend, were made between 7-8pm on Monday, with 56,002 sales made in an hour.
Overall, there was a 1 per cent year-on-year increase in online shopping over the entire weekend, with 1,980,544 purchases being made in the UK.
Saturday saw a 5 per cent jump in sales year-on-year, with 611,208 purchases being made, versus last year’s 583,703, but is still the least favourite day to shop over the August bank holiday for British consumers.
Meanwhile, Sunday saw a 3 per cent decline in online sales year-on-year. This year 612,028 purchases were made, while 632,481 sales were made last year. However, it still remains the second most popular day over this bank holiday weekend to shop for UK consumers.
All the major online retailers, including Amazon, Tesco, John Lewis and Argos, all held bank holiday sales over this past weekend in order to drive sales.
Chris Boaz, Head of Marketing, of PCA Predict said: “Given the prolonged good weather over this past bank holiday weekend, online retailers did quite well to improve sales year-on-year on both Saturday and Monday. Holding sales over this weekend, like many of the biggest online retailers did, makes a lot of sense, given it is the last bank holiday until the holiday season, which is many months away.”
“Crucially also, it is the last weekend before school restarts, meaning many parents were likely making last minute purchases. This puts a lot of pressure on retailers to ensure deliveries get out on time to parents ahead of the new school year. In order to avoid an unhappy customer, address data verification technology ensures the best possible chance of a customer receiving their delivery on time, without any difficulties.”
