Mother’ Day 2005: It Was More Than Cards And Flowers Online

Mother's Day-related spending on jewelry and chocolates on the Internet drove a 24% increase in e-commerce volume for VeriSign Inc., to $4.4 billion, the Mountain View, Calif.-based transaction gateway for online merchants said today. Transaction volume for the company during the period measured, April 25 through May 8, jumped by nearly one-third, to 54.8 million, over the like period in 2004 (April 26-May 9), resulting in an $80 average ticket overall. The peak spending day, VeriSign says, was May 2, which accounted for $473 million in spending on 5.43 million transactions. The largest third-party processor of online transactions, VeriSign says its gateway handles more than 37% of all e-commerce volume in North America, serving 135,000 online merchants. Indicating that the holiday has become a matter of more than cards and flowers, the big winner for Mother's Day was jewelry, and in particular, diamonds. Spending in the jewelry category jumped 79% over the same period in 2004, while diamond spending more than doubled on a 540% surge in transactions. The average ticket for diamonds was $517. Chocolate sales ballooned 35%, accounting for 56% of spending in the candy category, but, outside of chocolate, candy sales were flat. Flower spending actually dropped 13%, while transaction volume was flat. “Mother's Day has arrived as one of our larger retail holidays,” said Trevor Healy, vice president at VeriSign Payment Services, in a statement. “Where once the holiday would have been acknowledged with a phone call and a heartfelt card, we're increasingly seeing people using it as an opportunity to send expensive items.”