Christmas shopping used to require a bus trip or two
Every quarter Google has a larger mobile market share than Apple, but when it comes to shopping online, iOS users outspent Android users with sales five times higher on Christmas Day. Apple iOS users accounted for 23% of total U.S. online sales, according to analytics data from IBM . Meanwhile, Google Android accounted for 4.6%. Apple’s mobile users not only accounted for more sales, but they also spent more than their Android counterparts every time they made a purchase. According to IBM, iOS users paid $93.94 per order on average, comparedwith $48.10 per order on average by Android users.
Joelle Middleman works at Best Buy and said the Saturday after Christmas is always hectic. “There’s rushes and then there’s sometimes periods like this where there’s not a lot of people but there’s always things to be doing. Whether it’s returns, exchanges, store pickups, answering the phone,” said Middleman. Elise Svodboda was one of dozens who waited in line to exchange a DVD series. “There were maybe like two or three people ahead of me and I was just immediately able to go up and get the DVD exchanged,” said Svodboda. Quick, easy exchanges that Svoboda said makes post Christmas crowds not so stressful after all.
Post Christmas shopping generates huge crowds
Being a denizen of Inland Harbor, I rarely shopped at home. Rather, I would hop onto a No.2 Shoreline bus and head to Hammond. This entailed a two-hour wait while trains backed up traffic. Then I would get off the bus in central downtown. If I was early, I would take in a movie at The Parthenon. Then I would exit the movie into a greatly thinned population made up mostly of people who had come to do their last-minute shopping on their way home.