Online retail sales surge 28%

[Chris]

By Bambi Francisco, CBS.MarketWatch.com
Last Update: 3:40 PM ET Aug 22, 2003
SAN FRANCISCO (CBS.MW) -- Fresh signs emerged Friday that online shopping sales are climbing.

Retail commerce on the Internet rose 28 percent to $12.47 billion in the second quarter compared with a year earlier, according to the Census Bureau of the Department of Commerce. That's nearly six times faster than the 5 percent growth in total retail sales in the same period.

Total retail sales hit $8.57 billion, up from $8.16 billion in the year-ago period. E-commerce sales accounted for 1.5 percent of total U.S. sales in the second quarter.

Also Friday, popular online retailer Amazon.com (AMZN) said it was beefing up its apparel store with bras endorsed by tennis star Anna Kournikova. See Net Stocks.

[incka]

I don't whan to guess how 'reaveling' those bras will be...

But thats great news for the industry... And for those of us who don't sell stuff it should increase advertising spending by big companies so we might be getting more from ads... and mike might get more than 20% from his template site!