Whether you shop online or on Main Street, your time browsing or buying is being carefully measured—and it’s decreasing. On average, Americans spend three-quarters of an hour, each day, buying goods and services, whether online or in stores, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS).
The figure has been consistent for several years, though it’s inched down from an average of 0.81 daily shopping hours in 2003.
The big shift, of course, is to online shopping: More than half of US consumers plan to buy some gifts online this holiday season, according to Gallup, double the number who clicked-and-bought in 2001.US shoppers spent on average 58.5 minutes in September online at mass merchants, including 39 minutes on Amazon and 17 minutes on Etsy, according to Nielsen data. Shoppers logged 14.55 minutes on Walmart.com and 10.2 on Target.com.
In October, shoppers spent an average of 21.5 minutes in US stores, more than a minute less than last year, according to Euclid, a company that places sensors in more than 700 US shopping locations, mostly at malls and shopping centers.
More than one in 10 shoppers left a store within five minutes of entering, according to Euclid. That’s higher than a 9% bounce rate—coming in and leaving almost immediately, from last October, and helps explain the average shopping time falling by 5.5% in the last year.
Shoppers are expected to tighten their times even in December. Euclid predicts “more focused shopping. Bounce rates will continue to rise and overall visit durations will shrink as shoppers, pressed for time, have less patience for longer lines and less interest in extensive browsing.”