Happy Cyber Monday — that is, if you can actually get to the sites and complete your purchase.
Target.com — offering 15 percent off of virtually everything online — has been unavailable off and on today as the company has struggled with what is supposed to be the biggest online shopping day of the year, the Associated Press reported.
By midday Monday EST, Target had received twice the digital crowd, compared to its prior busiest day, the company reported.
Once there, visitors may have received a message indicating a site error. A spokesperson for Target said the site is not down but struggling to process the number of orders it has received, according to CNN. Target shoppers are advised to refresh their browsers. The company reported it had to meter the traffic to its site.
As Cyber Monday celebrates its 10th anniversary as the online counter to Black Friday s retail mania, it is clear that the digital realm continues to overtake the brick-and-mortar shopping experience.
Retailers are expected to rack up as much as $3 billion in sales today, the AP reports. That would break last year s record. In fact, for the last six years, Cyber Monday has been the biggest online shopping day ever.
But given how pervasive online shopping has become, it s unclear online retailers even need their own day. They are claiming the whole holiday shopping season, it appars.
The National Retail Federation reports that more Americans shopped online over Thanksgiving through the weekend — 103 million — compared to the 102 million who shopped in actual stores.
Online shopping has cut into the deal-laden Black Friday shopping experience, as Queenie Wong and George Avalos reported.
On Black Friday, Neiman Marcus site crashed, TechCrunch reported.
Over the weekend and continuing on Cyber Monday, PayPal has struggled with the demand, says TechCrunch.
On Monday morning, about 20 percent could not use PayPal, with response times slowing to 14 seconds, better than the 22 second lag experienced by many on Sunday. PayPal reported that it resolved the issue.
It is the cyber shopping season now, and woe be the retailer with technical issues.
Above: PayPal s logo outside of its San Jose headquarters. (AP Photo/Paul Sakuma)
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