Holiday Season Report 2013 Past

Performance Tracking > 2013 Holiday Season

WebSitePulse 2013 Holiday Retail Performance and Uptime Report

The 2013 Holiday Season is expected to be tough for retailers this year. In fact, analysts at Morgan Stately predict sales growth will be the weakest since 2008 – only 1.6%, money.cnn.com reported. For comparison, sales in 2012 grew with 3.5%.

Experts say sales will be sluggish due to low consumer confidence and despite low gas prices and a rising stock market in the United States. Another factor is that people will have less time for shopping this holiday season, as late Thanksgiving means six fewer days to Christmas than last year, explained Bill Simon, head of Walmart’s US business, for The Financial Times.

Retailers, therefore, will be forced to reduce prices drastically in order to attract buyers. This holiday season is even said to bring “the most intense promotional environment since 2008,” according money.cnn.com.

Considering that promotions are expected to flood online and walk-in stores this year, we are led to believe that some of the most popular online stores will reach such high online visitors’ traffic that they may not even be able to handle it without any outages. Out of pure curiosity and the belief that websites should be well-prepared to bear heavy traffic load, we decided to monitor 10 of the most popular websites during the whole holiday season – from Nov 21st, 2013 until Jan 6th, 2014. We will be closely watching their availability and performance, and report their statistics on a daily basis.

As always, slow websites or such that experience availability interruptions during transactions will cause nothing but revenue losses and disappointed customers who would likely seek the products and services of their online competitors.

Daily Report for January 04, 2014

See report for:

WebSitePulse reports the following results from web performance measurement of the websites participating in the the Holiday Retail Performance and Uptime Report:

The daily Average Response time from all monitored websites was 3.92 sec.

The Average Response time as measured from the US East Coast (Washington, DC) was:	3.372 sec.
The Average Response time as measured from the US West Coast (Los Angeles, CA) was:	4.099 sec.
The Average Response time as measured from the US Central (Chicago, IL) was:	4.290 sec.

The Best Response time measured from US East Coast (Washington, DC):	2.017 sec.
The Best Response time measured from US West Coast (Los Angeles, CA):	2.246 sec.
The Best Response time measured from US Central (Chicago, IL):	2.370 sec.

The typical shopping transaction took the least time for target.com visitors - 2.370 sec., while the visitors of amazon.com had to be the most patient, as the shopping transaction there took in average of 6.557 sec.
Four of the monitored websites delivered above-the-average response times for their transactions, while six of them demonstrated below-the-average daily performance.

The daily average uptime for the entire Group was 97.45%.

The Average Uptime as measured from the US East Coast (Washington, DC) was:	97.47%
The Average Uptime as measured from the US West Coast (Los Angeles, CA) was:	97.42%
The Average Uptime as measured from the US Central (Chicago, IL):	97.45%

Eight websites were available with no interruptions - 100%.
Nine websites' availability was above the average, while one site dragged the average down with below-the-average availability.

Report Highlights

No events of particular importance or possible negative impact on the online visitors' interaction with the Websites included into the 2013 Holiday Season report were detected during the reported period, and according to WebSitePulse, the Group delivered the expected levels of End-User experience and Customer satisfaction.

Please, scroll down for Detailed Reports and Charts provided by WebSitePulse:

Daily Response Times

Legend:
amazon	bestbuy	target	kmart	sears
toysrus	walmart	overstock	qvc	tigerdirect

Average Response Times for January 04, 2014

#	Target	Los Angeles	Chicago	Washington	Avg. resp. time
1	target.com	2.494	2.600	2.017	2.370
2	tigerdirect.com	3.086	2.696	2.489	2.757
3	qvc.com	3.503	2.708	2.298	2.836
4	overstock.com	2.885	2.370	3.281	2.845
5	sears.com	2.741	3.387	2.466	2.865
6	bestbuy.com	2.246	4.728	2.464	3.146
7	kmart.com	4.504	4.679	3.565	4.249
8	toysrus.com	5.788	5.302	4.300	5.130
9	walmart.com	5.704	8.385	5.256	6.448
10	amazon.com	8.044	6.040	5.587	6.557

Average Response Times November 21, 2013 - January 04, 2014

#	Target	Los Angeles	Chicago	Washington	Avg. resp. time
1	target.com	2.366	2.985	2.057	2.469
2	overstock.com	2.637	2.302	2.690	2.543
3	qvc.com	3.060	2.707	2.139	2.635
4	sears.com	3.364	3.522	3.001	3.296
5	kmart.com	3.872	3.608	3.279	3.586
6	tigerdirect.com	3.821	3.760	3.275	3.619
7	bestbuy.com	3.059	5.774	3.096	3.976
8	toysrus.com	4.849	4.019	3.277	4.048
9	walmart.com	5.921	8.283	5.450	6.551
10	amazon.com	8.355	6.225	5.851	6.810

Hourly Average Response Times
Select individual website to display:

Legend:
individual site response times	monitored group average response times

Average response times by hour for January 04, 2014

Target	Hours
Target	00	01	02	03	04	05	06	07	08	09	10	11	12	13	14	15	16	17	18	19	20	21	22	23
amazon	6.40	6.50	6.37	6.96	6.80	6.19	6.58	6.28	6.91	6.36	6.34	6.34	7.21	6.34	6.41	6.37	7.12	6.56	6.34	6.41	7.26	6.50	6.38	6.45
bestbuy	2.81	2.89	3.44	2.86	2.42	3.45	2.52	2.40	2.43	2.86	1.90	2.98	3.79	3.62	3.92	3.43	4.11	3.51	3.87	3.50	2.62	3.38	3.26	3.55
kmart	4.92	5.01	4.49	4.48	4.18	4.43	4.85	5.27	4.30	4.13	3.98	3.82	4.80	4.18	4.20	4.78	3.60	3.49	3.93	4.52	3.74	3.48	3.55	3.85
overstock	2.75	2.61	2.75	2.56	2.52	2.86	2.83	2.75	2.60	2.79	2.90	3.30	2.98	2.65	2.95	2.87	3.01	3.03	3.41	2.78	2.55	2.90	3.08	2.87
qvc	2.76	3.73	2.46	2.61	2.45	5.25	2.58	2.43	2.57	2.43	2.36	2.36	3.08	2.54	2.67	2.60	4.82	2.82	2.52	2.54	2.55	2.55	2.67	2.74
sears	2.55	3.16	3.85	2.63	2.91	2.81	2.68	2.52	2.94	2.57	2.39	3.43	2.79	2.02	3.35	2.81	2.16	2.65	2.97	2.36	3.30	3.21	2.96	3.70
target	2.56	2.64	2.16	2.13	2.94	2.63	1.98	2.07	2.71	2.41	2.47	2.63	2.71	2.33	2.35	1.95	2.00	2.11	2.45	2.32	2.45	2.40	2.11	2.38
tigerdirect	3.34	1.04	0.35	0.34	0.37	4.13	0.36	0.78	3.32	3.34	3.67	3.44	3.41	3.31	3.34	3.42	3.67	3.54	3.45	3.55	3.28	3.79	3.46	3.46
toysrus	4.86	4.84	5.48	4.84	4.37	6.87	9.65	6.69	6.70	5.13	5.41	5.63	4.37	3.99	4.63	4.33	4.40	4.05	4.46	5.17	4.11	3.98	3.91	5.24
walmart	5.61	6.49	6.79	5.60	7.89	6.95	6.42	6.59	6.19	5.76	5.62	6.18	6.65	5.98	6.60	6.24	6.50	6.35	6.08	7.78	6.13	6.73	6.27	7.35

Average response times by hour November 21, 2013 - January 04, 2014

Target	Hours
Target	00	01	02	03	04	05	06	07	08	09	10	11	12	13	14	15	16	17	18	19	20	21	22	23
amazon	6.78	6.67	6.88	6.71	6.86	6.77	6.84	6.78	6.83	6.87	6.82	6.79	6.83	7.07	6.74	6.78	6.81	6.91	6.68	6.73	6.89	6.76	6.81	6.84
bestbuy	3.69	3.63	3.80	3.31	3.37	3.71	3.82	3.80	3.92	4.00	3.99	4.01	4.13	4.12	4.17	4.17	4.08	4.14	4.11	4.37	4.21	4.52	4.36	4.01
kmart	3.49	3.84	3.99	3.59	3.49	3.69	3.75	3.80	3.57	3.40	3.46	3.46	3.50	3.53	3.51	3.39	3.46	3.62	3.66	3.50	3.49	3.51	3.62	3.77
overstock	2.55	2.61	2.56	2.57	2.49	2.54	2.47	2.48	2.45	2.54	2.51	2.56	2.63	2.54	2.53	2.54	2.51	2.56	2.57	2.49	2.54	2.56	2.58	2.67
qvc	2.76	2.69	2.42	2.34	2.29	3.12	2.29	2.29	2.33	2.39	2.55	2.73	2.73	2.72	2.71	2.66	2.73	2.65	2.71	2.65	2.68	2.96	2.97	2.86
sears	3.39	3.35	3.62	3.28	3.16	3.15	3.09	2.99	3.19	3.04	3.39	3.36	3.27	3.45	3.19	3.14	3.26	3.33	3.42	3.18	3.27	3.32	3.63	3.63
target	2.43	2.31	2.40	2.39	2.43	2.82	2.49	2.44	2.35	2.31	2.42	2.40	2.61	2.59	2.44	2.41	2.50	2.56	2.55	2.36	2.47	2.50	2.51	2.58
tigerdirect	4.09	4.41	3.84	3.27	3.67	3.64	3.49	3.37	3.44	3.76	3.57	3.64	3.57	3.60	3.55	3.56	3.56	3.60	3.60	3.55	3.55	3.56	3.49	3.46
toysrus	3.64	3.53	3.38	3.76	3.64	3.57	7.98	5.58	4.61	4.32	4.18	3.92	3.85	3.87	3.79	3.82	3.75	3.73	3.73	3.63	3.75	3.67	3.66	3.78
walmart	6.47	6.33	6.14	6.42	6.25	6.47	6.47	6.63	6.29	6.54	6.27	6.44	6.52	6.70	6.61	6.86	6.78	6.56	6.45	6.74	6.49	6.93	7.10	6.76

Uptime

Uptime January 04, 2014

#	Target	Los Angeles	Chicago	Washington	Avg. uptime
1	walmart.com	100.000%	100.000%	100.000%	100.000%
2	overstock.com	100.000%	100.000%	100.000%	100.000%
3	qvc.com	100.000%	100.000%	100.000%	100.000%
4	toysrus.com	100.000%	100.000%	100.000%	100.000%
5	sears.com	100.000%	100.000%	100.000%	100.000%
6	amazon.com	100.000%	100.000%	100.000%	100.000%
7	kmart.com	100.000%	100.000%	100.000%	100.000%
8	bestbuy.com	100.000%	100.000%	100.000%	100.000%
9	target.com	98.610%	99.390%	99.590%	99.197%
10	tigerdirect.com	75.610%	75.130%	75.150%	75.297%

Uptime November 21, 2013 - January 04, 2014

#	Target	Los Angeles	Chicago	Washington	Avg. uptime
1	overstock.com	100.000%	100.000%	100.000%	100.000%
2	bestbuy.com	99.991%	99.994%	100.000%	99.995%
3	amazon.com	99.996%	99.979%	99.987%	99.987%
4	sears.com	99.799%	99.648%	99.732%	99.727%
5	kmart.com	99.734%	99.613%	99.728%	99.691%
6	qvc.com	99.643%	99.668%	99.531%	99.614%
7	walmart.com	99.395%	99.354%	99.348%	99.365%
8	tigerdirect.com	99.329%	99.286%	99.240%	99.285%
9	target.com	98.921%	99.004%	98.858%	98.928%
10	toysrus.com	98.702%	98.658%	98.704%	98.688%

Methodology:
The 2013 Holiday Season Reports reflect a complete web transaction, representative for the End Users' interactions with a website. The reporting period covers the dates between November 21, 2013 and January 6, 2014. Performance and availability measurements are made for a typical multi-step web transaction at 15 minute monitoring interval, every day 24/7. The WebSitePulse application monitoring service is used to collect data and to create the reports.
The steps in each transaction are comparable for all websites, and reflect the real online shopper experience. The simultaneous monitoring is performed from 3 US-based locations of the WebSitePulse monitoring network: Los Angeles, CA, Chicago, IL, and Washington, DC. In case of a detected malfunction or unavailability, the system performs automated error verification from 3 independent resources and only after the above procedure is performed and has returned consistent results, the detected error is confirmed, recorded, and included in the daily performance reports. In these cases, an advanced WebSitePulse exclusive feature comes into play - Forced Monitoring -, which automatically switches to a 3 minute monitoring interval for increased accuracy.

About WebSitePulse:
WebSitePulse is a leading provider of global, independent, and objective availability and performance monitoring of web sites, servers, network components, web applications, e-business- and email round-trip transactions.

Contact:
For more information about this report please contact:
George T., CTO
phone: 1-407-380-1600
email:

Reproduction:
WebSitePulse launched the Performance and Uptime Reports program to keep the general public and the Internet community informed about the performance of specific websites and the challenges their webmasters, owners and operators are facing on a daily basis, especially when the web traffic intensifies due to some special events through the year. Some of the most popular web destinations, related to each particular event, are selected for the purpose of the Reports, and data from their performance measurements is made available on the WebSitePulse public website.

With the intention to broadly disseminate this information for the benefit of the Internet community, we encourage the use of this information without prior approval and under the following Terms and Conditions:

WebSitePulse should be referred as the "Source" of the information;
WebSitePulse should be acknowledged as the owner of the copyrights of the information in the Reports;
The texts of the Reports could be changed or altered to better suit the needs and the style of the publisher without prior notice to WebSitePulse. However, the integrity and the meaning of the information should be preserved;

The Data from the performance measurements cannot be changed or manipulated and should be used "as is".

WebSitePulse 2013 Holiday Retail Performance and Uptime Report

Services

Features

Pricing

Apps & Extensions

Free Tools

About Us

Partners

Contact Us

Account

Help Center