US shoppers spend $41bn in Thanksgiving weekend

The traditional start to the shopping season kicks off enthusiastically

The weekend following Thanksgiving is probably the most important of the whole US retailing year.

The amount of money shelled out at the shops this weekend hit $41.2bn (£25bn) - a rise of 0.5% on 2008.

Even so, credit-crunched Americans spent around 8% less each than normal, an average of $343, in the days following last Thursday's holiday.

The total was higher because more of them - 195 million - shopped either online or by going out to stores.

The figures come from the largest retail trade organisation in the world, the National Retail Federation, a body that illustrates why we call the United States a consumer society.

Its members employ 24 million people - around one in five US workers.

Shoppers at dawn

Thanksgiving began as a harvest celebration. It was formerly a Christian festival and became a secular holiday in the 1940s.

There is no mistaking the big event these days. The National Retail Federation reported that a third of those who made a trip to the shops were there before 5am.

Those who stayed at home also did their bit for the consumer sector that makes up 70% of the US economy.

Ultimately, what we wanted to see was flat or better sales and that's what we got. You've got to remember the discounts were far fewer and less Marc Pado Cantor Fitzgerald

The Analytics firm Comscore said on Sunday that US online spending on Black Friday hit a record $595m, a rise of 11% compared with a year earlier.

Shares in the giant online retailer Amazon hit an all time high in Monday trading.

Discounting is always a big part of the holiday season, but analysts said retailers had done a good job of keeping stock levels in line, so they had not been forced into desperate price cuts like in 2008. That should help margins improve, at least compared with a year ago, they suggested.

"Ultimately, what we wanted to see was flat or better sales and that's what we got. You've got to remember the discounts were far fewer and less," said Marc Pado, a US market strategist at Cantor Fitzgerald in San Francisco.

Economists and analysts are watching the holiday shopping season to see how much consumers have been affected by recession, high unemployment and the credit crunch.

Investors will now look for a clearer picture of the month when retailers release November sales later this week.