Nevada holiday spending growing, tops $4.5B for first time
Some 1.4 million Nevadans took advantage of discounts and promotions during the holiday weekend, spending $400.5 million on gifts, decorations and other items, according to estimates from the Nevada Retail Association.
The Nevada retail trade group projects Nevada consumer spending during the season will grow by 4.2 percent this year and surpass $4.5 billion for the first time.
On the national level, holiday spending is projected to increase by 3.6 percent over last year to reach $655 billion, according to National Retail Federation (NRF) estimates. The holiday shopping season spans November and December, and consumer spending figures exclude auto sales, restaurants and gasoline.
“Thanks to an improving statewide employment picture and rising wages, Nevadans will be able to take advantage of the many holiday discounts and promotions offered by retailers throughout the state,” Bryan Wachter, senior vice president of RAN, sad in a statement.
In Nevada, online shoppers outnumbered in-store shoppers 973,600 to 889,100 as many retailers offered the same doorbuster prices on both their sales floors and websites.
Online and mobile shopping was especially attractive to U.S. consumers, who spent an estimated $5.27 billion on Thanksgiving and Black Friday, according to Adobe Digital Insights. That figure was 17.7 percent higher than a year ago and included a record $3.34 billion in spending during Black Friday alone.
The strong Thanksgiving weekend online shopping activity continued on Cyber Monday, which the NRF predicted would attract 122 million consumers across the United States. In Nevada, nearly 1.1 million adults were expected to shop online during Cyber Monday, according to RAN. The online spending record set on Black Friday was quickly eclipsed on Cyber Monday, which recorded a new one-day high of $3.39 billion, Adobe Digital Insights said. Overall, total online spending in November reached $39.9 billion, a 7.4 percent increase over a year ago, according to Adobe Digital Insights.
In Nevada, nonstore retail sales, which include online retailers, are trending up by 16.7 percent year-over-year and have surpassed $1 billion in the 12 months through August. Based on these trends, the Nevada retail trade group estimates that total nonstore sales in the state could approach $300 million this holiday season, surpassing last year’s total of $236.8 million.
