Brian Tinsman
Digital Properties Manager
Updated on 11/28/17: Cyber Monday 2017 was the single biggest day of online shopping in U.S. consumer history, generating $6.6 billion in sales and vastly exceeding last year’s record.
Thanksgiving and Black Friday also smashed records in online shopping, combining for $7.9 billion and helping to fuel more than $50 billion in online sales between November 1-27.
Adobe released the numbers on Nov. 28 and predicted that this could be the first 100 billion-dollar online holiday shopping season for U.S. consumers.
Shopping holidays that used to be known for aggressive crowds have turned to online sales, with mobile sales now leading in-person and desktop purchases.
On Black Friday, approximately two-thirds of 159 million online shoppers used mobile devices. comScore also reported that apparel, accessories and consumer electronics combined for more than $1.1 billion in sales.
“The strong performance on Thanksgiving and Black Friday bodes well for Cyber Monday, which we expect to reach $4.5 billion in overall digital sales,” comScore SVP of Marketing and Insights Andrew Lipsman said in a press release.
It surpassed that number by more than one-third.
“[This will make it] the leading online spending day for the eighth consecutive year, as people continue their holiday gift buying at work – away from the prying eyes of their families.”
This is tremendous news for Loudoun County, which is home to the No. 1 data center hub in the world, as well as the MAE-East Internet Exchange, meaning that up to 70 percent of the world’s Internet traffic passes through Loudoun each day.
Housed in Loudoun’s data centers are thousands of companies, many with an e-commerce component, including some of the largest U.S. retailers.
As an industry, data centers have been preparing for the surge in Internet activity for weeks, which typically kicks off the holiday shopping season. Power, cooling, security (both physical and cyber) are just some of the considerations that go into making sure that presents arrive on time in holiday stockings this year.
There is no alternative to flawless execution. Mark Gaydos, CMO for Nlyte Software, estimates that the average data center outage in 2016 cost $8,851 per minute, “and that’s on an average day, not the busiest day of the year.”
So, while you surf the net for deals, know that Loudoun data centers work hard to make sure that the order gets through. Among other things, you can thank Loudoun data centers for contributing to holiday cheer.
