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Zhu Zhu Pets Cyber Monday

November 30, 2009 by · Comments Off on Zhu Zhu Pets Cyber Monday 

From one Black Friday shopper to another, let me just say that I hope you survived. And I hope that you didn’t end up in a tussle over a Zhu Zhu Pet Hamster.

But even if you did, don’t worry. It’s onward and upward for the holiday shopping season.

Today is Cyber Monday
— the first Monday after Thanksgiving that’s known as the ceremonial kickoff to the online holiday shopping season. It’s the day when retailers pump up their Web sites with promotions and shoppers log on, often from work, to buy gifts away from the prying eyes of their families.

It’s like Black Friday, only it’s online.

Or at least that’s how it started a few years ago, when most Americans didn’t have high-speed Internet access at home and had to rely on their work computers for e-commerce.

Today, though, that’s not the case. And more and more retail analysts are starting to insist that Cyber Monday is nothing more than a marketing hoax — kind of like what some people say about global warming.

The concept was coined in 2005 by Shop.org, a division of the National Retail Federation, after the trade group’s members noticed a trend of people shopping online on the Monday after Thanksgiving.

“It is clearly overhyped and oversaturated with propaganda,” said Marshal Cohen, chief retail analyst for market research firm NPD Group Inc. “Now, so many people have computers at home, the Monday thing is more about: Let me see what the deals are.”

Indeed, he points out that the busiest online shopping day coincides with the last day you can ship items and have them arrive on Christmas Day.

In some ways, that parallels Black Friday, which is no longer the busiest day for holiday sales that keeps bricks-and-mortar retailers in the black. Their busiest shopping day typically falls a day or two before Christmas.

But still, if you’re tech savvy and inclined to take part in Cyber Monday, you still can make out on some great deals today.

Even Cohen admits that it is likely to be a busy online shopping day, filled with promotions.

According to Shop.org’s eHoliday Survey, 87 percent of retailers will have a special promotion for Cyber Monday, up from 84 percent last year and 72 percent in 2007.

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