Local web sales up on Cyber Monday
Posted : Nov 30, 2009 10:33 PM
Updated: Dec 1, 2009 3:50 AM
With Black Friday behind us, Cyber Monday steps up as the all important day for web retailers. For the Colorado Springs based Chefs Catalog, it's been a nice haul so far. "We get a chance to get an early indicator starting with Black Friday." says Tm Littleton, President/CEO of Springs based Chefs Catalog. "All through the weekend it's been steadily up since last year."
Now in their 30th year, their focus has shifted to the web where the vast majority of their orders now come from. "The majority of our business now comes online versus telephone and mail. It's even higher this time of year." says Littleton, "That store never closes so they can shop in the comfort of their own home 24 hours a day."
And while this web giant ships thousands of gifts, another business is taking their first bite of the web pie a few miles away. "I think it's proving to be a lot more important to us than we thought." says Matt Chmielarczyk, manager at Mountain Chalet in downtown Colorado Springs. Mountain Chalet is known as a local place with knowledgeable sales people. But they say they couldn't ignore the internet any longer. "We're finding not that it's hard to compete in this marketplace and in this industry without having an internet presence of some sort." says Chmielarczyk. And much like Chef's, the Chalet is doing pretty good for themselves. "Today we did an order for New Zealand!" says Chmielarczyk, "It's been the best internet month we've had since we started our website."
Retailers are reporting around a 20% increase in online sales for cyber Monday this year as compared to last year. The only problems for many cities in economic turmoil such as Colorado Springs are the sales tax. Since there are no city sales taxes online, many communities miss out on a much needed economic boost
