Thanksgiving Sales Beat Record in Chase for Early Deals: Retail

U.S. consumers poured into the malls and took to the Web during Thanksgiving weekend, spending a record $52.4 billion at a pace that may be hard to sustain as the holiday shopping season gets under way.

Retail sales climbed 16 percent, and shoppers spent $398.62 on average, up from $365.34 a year earlier, the National Retail Federation said yesterday, citing a survey from BIGresearch. Web sales on Black Friday surged 26 percent to $816 million and 18 percent to $479 million on Thanksgiving Day, said ComScore, a Reston, Virginia-based research firm.