Holiday e-commerce sales are up 14 percent for the first 20 days of November

Americans appear to be a giving mood this holiday season — at least when it comes to buying items on online retail sites. comScore announced today that it expects e-commerce spending to grow by 15 percent this year, part of a “significant channel shift” from bricks-and-mortar retail to online retail.

In fact, comScore’s report indicates that the holiday shopping season is already off to a fast start. During the first 20 days of November, $9.7 billion has been spent at e-commerce retailers. That’s a 14 percent increase over the same period last year.

The heaviest shopping day to date was Wednesday, November 16th, with $688 million spent online.

“With the persistent backdrop of macroeconomic uncertainty and continued high unemployment, consumers appear to be increasingly favoring the online benefits of convenience and lower prices,” said comScore’s Gian Fulgoni. “Based on the expectation that these positive spending trends will continue for the season, this year promises to be a Merry Christmas indeed for online retailers.”

Obviously, that could be very good news for Amazon.com, which is currently rolling out a number of deals in anticipation of Black Friday and Cyber Monday. In fact, Amazon.com got things rolling early this year, opening up a Black Friday deals store on November 1st. (A Tuesday).

Meanwhile, Bloomberg reports that eBay is setting up holiday “pop up” locations in New York, London and San Francisco where shoppers can easily purchase items from the site at physical locations.

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