Books, clothing, and schoolsupplies were the big categories for students shopping online as they headed back to school this fall, according to Claria's FeedbackResearch.com. Sales of clothes(54 percent) were up almost 20 percent over last year's figures and book purchases(62 percent) were up 5 percent.
Stories from Internet Retailer and iMedia included these nuggets:
--Textbook shopping saw an 89 percent increase from June to August 2004 with Amazon.com taking the lead as the most popular Web site for textbooks/books.
--OldNavy.com was the most popular apparel Web site for consumers with 44 percent surveyed answering that they bought or were planning to buy clothes from OldNavy.com. Second and third in the clothing category were JCPenny.com and Gap.com.
--In school supplies, Staples.com led with 22.2 percent of the total category traffic.
Most importantly, while not all kids are buying online, 63% in the study said they turned to the web for pricing information or research on a product.