For the full holiday online shopping season, $29.1 billion was spent online, marking a 4-percent increase versus the same period last year, says comScore. The season featured distinct periods of strong spending growth surrounding the Thanksgiving-Black Friday timeframe and the final shopping week leading up to Christmas.

Jewelry & Watches, following a disastrous 2008 holiday season in which sales plummeted 29 percent, rebounded strongly to rank as the top performing online retail category for the 2009 holiday season growing 20 percent versus year ago. Consumer Electronics ranked second with 15-percent sales growth, bolstered by strong sales of flat panel TVs, mobile devices and e-readers. Other categories performing quite strongly included event tickets (up 8 percent), computer hardware (up 7 percent) and books & magazines (up 6 percent).

In November, German visits to online retail sites, according to comScore, got off to a slightly slower start than in France and the UK, but still showed a healthy 17 percent average weekly growth versus the typical shopping week. Amazon’s sites were the fastest growing retail property during November – up 46 percent on the base period average – followed by Neckermann Gruppe (up 18 percent).

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• US retailers see 11% growth in Black Friday online sales
• Mobile shopping grew by 186.5% in UK during December, says IBM
• Visits to fashion sites down 8% year-on-year, says ComScore
• December online sales were lower than November, says IMRG