• by Paul Gough , December 1, 2003

It was a busy and profitable "Black Friday" for the nation's brick-and-mortar retailers - and one of double-digit growth for online retailers.

Online retail sales rose 36 percent to $200 million on Nov. 28, comScore reported Saturday evening. That's up from the $145 million in online retail sales rung up during the day after Thanksgiving in 2002. The data from comScore doesn't include sales from travel and auction sites, which also aren't computed in quarterly online spending data.

For the week ended Friday, comScore said there were $1.2 billion in online sales, an increase of 31 percent from $895 million rung up during Thanksgiving Week 2002. That data also doesn't include travel and auctions.

The big winners for the week were software and media, which comScore said performed well above the online retail average. Computer software, movies/video, music and video games showed growth of 50 percent to 100 percent compared to a year ago, comScore said. Home & Garden was up 60 percent. Other categories - including Apparel/Accessories, Consumer Electronics and Toys, were also up.

On Saturday evening, comScore predicted online retail spending in November and December will be between $12.1 billion to $12.6 billion, up between 25 percent and 30 percent from the $9.7 billion racked up a year ago.