As the entire Northeast turned white under a blanket of snow last weekend, retailers from the fashion, electronics, and sporting goods sectors were reporting a disappointing outcome for the second biggest shopping weekend of the year. But outdoor retail and e-tailers seemed to benefit most from the extreme weather.


The eSpending report from Goldman, Sachs & Co., Harris Interactive, and Nielsen NetRatings revealed several trends. The weekly report showed that people began their online holiday shopping earlier with 51% saying they have started their online shopping during November, up from 43% during the same time last year. This increase boosted online sales to $8.5 billion, up 55% over last year.


The greatest increase in web spending was centered on the Northeast. “We saw a massive increase in weekend traffic coming from the New York metropolitan area — on the order of 100% week over week…It can only be because of the blizzard. Send more blizzards — they're good for online shopping.” Nirav Tolia, CEO of Shopping.com, told a local paper.


Ed Foy Jr., CEO of e-Fashion Consulting, told a local paper, “The increase (in online sales) absolutely was because of the bad weather… It was amazing. We watched everything live online and saw orders come in from areas like Boston, just as the storm was hitting there.”

The second installment of the 2003 eHoliday Mood Study, conducted by Shop.org and BizRate.com, found that more than half of online retailers saw sales increase more than 25% over last year during the same period. This sales surge has led to increased cheer with 71% of online retailers feeling optimistic about the holiday season, up 4% from two weeks ago.


Another interesting trend is that consumers navigated the Web through a variety of means, with 37% of online shoppers using Google, followed by eBay, which attracted 27%, and Yahoo! Search, used by 25%.


The majority of on-line shoppers knew where they were going right off the bat, with 51% of going directly to a retail Web site by typing in the URL. Ugg boots and adidas both made the Top 10 list of search terms for the week.


The online retailers aren’t the only ones benefiting from Mother Nature’s onslaught in the region. Outdoor retailers like REI and EMS found both online and brick ‘n mortar sales received a boost from the blizzard.


Mike Foley, Marketing Manager for REI told SEW, “Sales for the Northeast before the storm were slower than the rest of the country.” He went on to say that REI’s, “Boston store almost doubled sales on Saturday” while the snow was coming down. “For REI, weather is huge,” he said. “It gets cold and sales go up. There really is this immediate response.”


Mark Van Saun, the marketing manager for EMS told SEW, “Sales in our retail stores were clearly impacted by the storm on Saturday, but though snow continued in areas of New England area on Sunday, EMS stores largely recovered then.” He went on to say that EMS.com, the company’s online store, “saw a huge lift over the weekend,” and attributed much of the gain to the weather.


The local specialty outdoor stores were helped by the weather as well. Bill White, co-owner of New England Backpacker, told SEW that the storm, “…definitely caused a sales spike. This time of year we’re dealing strictly with winter products, and snow is like food for thought.” White did say that Sunday was slow. “People just couldn’t get out,” he said.