Online marketplace eBay Inc has been steadily reporting strong mobile sales over the holidays. And now that the biggest gift-giving days have come and gone, eBay is reporting its final numbers for the holiday shopping season.
eBay’s US mobile sales from 25 November to 25 December grew to nearly $100 million, a 134 per cent increase over $42.7 million in the same period last year. Worldwide, eBay’s mobile sales during that month grew to nearly $230 million, a 166 per cent increase over $86.4 million for the same period last year.
“As mobile shopping peaked this year, eBay led the way by becoming the go-to shopping destination,” says Steve Yankovich, vice president – of mobile, eBay. “With more than 30 million downloads of its mobile apps worldwide, eBay is clearly a barometer for mobile shopping trends. We see people buying everything from designer apparel to cars and trucks on their phones regularly, and purchases being made through eBay mobile every second.”
eBay also noted mobile sales trends for all of 2010. In the US, the top five categories ranked by the number of items sold through eBay’s mobile apps for the year were: clothing, shoes and accessories; cell phones and PDAs; collectibles; jewellery and watches; and toys and hobbies.
Clothing and accessories was a consistently popular category for mobile after eBay unveiled its fashion app for iPhone this summer, eBay says. In Canada and France, clothing and accessories was the top category overall for mobile sales; it was a top three category in Australia, Germany, the UK and the US. During the busy shopping period between the day after Thanksgiving and 12 December, clothing and accessories ranked first in the US for mobile sales volume as well as number of items sold.
The categories with the largest amount of US mobile sales in dollars for 2010 were: Cars and trucks, Clothing and accessories, Auto parts, Sporting goods and Cell phones and accessories.
Cars and trucks ranked in the top five mobile sales categories in every state except Hawaii, and auto parts was a top five category in all 50 states. Other categories that were shopped through eBay mobile in nearly every state were clothing and accessories (49 states) and sporting goods (47 states).
eBay’s main shopping app for the iPhone has been downloaded more than 14 million times. eBay also has launched apps for its sellers, a shopping app for its event ticket subsidiary StubHub, a deals app, a classifieds app and an app for the iPad tablet computer.
– IndiaRetailing Bureau
