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On Wednesday morning, the mass media abounded with pseudo-apocalyptic horrors. Dozens are "exposed" to anthrax. The U.S. has bombed a Red Cross building in Afghanistan. Israel has suspended relations with the Palestinians.
But there is one bright spot in the world, if anyone cares any longer to take a look: E-commerce is doing fine.
This was revealed in a report by Nielsen//Netratings. In a study joined by Harris Interactive, the Internet research firm found that people spent $4.7 billion online in September, a 54 percent increase over last year. Also, there were almost 39 million buyers last month, a record number.
Online spending did fall 15 percent from August to September, the company said; in August, $5.6 billion was spent online, a record for non-holiday spending. But there were fewer purchasers that month -- 37.1 million buyers.
As expected, online spending on travel was the hardest hit by jitters following the Sept. 11 attacks. There was a 24 percent drop in sales at travel sites. But Sean Kaldor, Netratings' vice president for analytical services, said the sites fared better than many people had expected, and there were already signs of a rebound. He said that traffic at most travel sites had returned to normal levels.
Kaldor suggested that this was a sign that online selling was a fundamentally strong business.
"Everyone thought things would grind to a standstill (after the terrorist attacks)," he said. "But out of the 14 product categories we reviewed, 11 grew."
Book sales "were particularly healthy," Kaldor said. They totaled $300 million, which is a record for a non-holiday period. For the past few months, Kaldor said, book sales have grown faster than all other products.
Computer software and health and beauty product sales were among those that Kaldor said had strong sales in September. He said software sales probably had to do with the spate of computer viruses that spread in September (people purchased anti-virus programs) -- but he said he didn't know if the health sales had to do with the threat of bioterrorism.
Representatives of e-commerce firms declined to comment on their sales, as many of them are set to announce their corporate earnings during the next few days. But a few people at travel companies did say they saw signs, already, of a rebound in traffic to their sites.
Suzi Levine, a marketing director at Expedia, agreed that traffic to the company's website barely dipped during the past month, but that many people were coming to the site for travel information, not necessarily for purchases.
"People needed something very different from us at that time," she said. "There was a lot in flux, and there remains a lot in flux. People didn't know if they can use an e-ticket, or if a certain airport was open."
Kaldor said there was no sign yet of a holiday rush at e-commerce sites-- that often begins in November.
