PriceGrabber.com a part of Experian, revealed Black Friday shopping data from its site showing continued growth as consumers go online to kick off this holiday season on Thanksgiving Day. Popular product categories from Black Friday include: Electronics, Computers, Clothing, Cameras and Video Games.

PriceGrabber.com estimates the total volume of merchant referrals generated to sellers on Black Friday has increased 47 percent over last year with an average order referral of $431. According to JupiterResearch, “Online buying continues to grow, relatively unfettered by macroeconomic factors. In fact, online retail sales for the 2007 holiday season will increase by 20 percent over sales for the 2006 season to surpass $39 billion.”

PriceGrabber.com is a resource to shoppers — helping them find the right product, from the right retailer, at the best price. The site also offers insight on consumer shopping behavior and trends.

Top Five Things We Didn’t Expect to See on Black Friday

1. Black Friday shopping started on Thursday — consumers started shopping
online earlier than expected this year with a 54 percent growth year
over year in traffic to merchants on the Thanksgiving holiday.

2. Video Games — The Nintendo Wii dominated the hotly-contested video
game console marketplace with a sales lead increase of 467 percent over
2006, easily beating the Microsoft Xbox 360, Sony’s PlayStation 3 and
PlayStation 2.

3. The Microsoft Zune beat all models in the Apple iPod line in searches
this year. Interest in the Zune, has increased 246 percent in recent
days and receives 13.3 percent of all inquiries in the MP3 market. The
Zune offers a lower price point compared to similar players and
includes a built-in FM Tuner.

4. Clothing picks up speed — Women’s apparel has seen an increase of more
than 100 percent over the last six weeks leading into the holiday
season. Leading the most popular clothing categories are women’s shoes
and handbags.

5. Toys made in the U.S.A. — Statistics show that there has been a 650
percent increase in keyword searches of “Made in USA” on
PriceGrabber.com year over year. PriceGrabber.com’s Holiday Shopping
Survey revealed that 73 percent of online shoppers said that it is
important this holiday season to purchase products that are made in the
USA. With recent reports of the possibility of the millions of toys
manufactured in China being recalled for lead contamination and loose
magnets, toys are going to be closely scrutinized this holiday season.

Top-selling Products on Black Friday

1. Nintendo Wii Console

2. Microsoft Zune 30GB Media Player – Brown

3. TomTom ONE 3rd Edition GPS

4. Activision Guitar Hero III Legends of Rock Bundle

5. Canon PowerShot SD1000 Silver Digital Camera

6. Microsoft Office 2004 Student and Teacher

7. Western Digital My Book Essential Edition External 500GB Hard Drive

8. Magellan Maestro 3100 GPS

9. Canon PowerShot SD750 Digital Camera

10. Canon EOS Regel XTi Black SLR Digital Camera