Dec. 13 (UPI) — Retail sales in the United States rose only slightly in November in somewhat of a disappointing start to the holiday season, the Commerce Department said in its monthly report Friday.
The report cited $528 billion in retail and food services sales, an increase of 0.2 percent over October. The increase was significantly lower than the 0.5 percent predicted by most analysts.
A late start to the traditional shopping season, however, could explain part of the downturn. A late Thanksgiving this year pushed “Cyber Monday” to Dec. 1 and out of the November numbers.
Total sales for the three-month period from September through November were up 3.5 percent from the same period in 2018, the report said, while sales for the two-month September-to-October period were revised upward from 0.3 percent to 0.4 percent.
“Non-store,” or online retailers like Amazon, performed better last month — climbing 0.8 percent for November, representing a 11.5 percent increase over October 2018.
Among traditional retailers, electronics stores performed best with an increase of 0.7 percent, although their sales were still down 1.5 percent from last November.
