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A 22 percent increase in sales from last year's day after Thanksgiving put more money in the pockets of online retailers this year.

Black Friday Shoppers Spend $531 Million Online

Online research firm comScore saw a whole lot of money flowing to non-travel retailers from US customers on the traditional kickoff to holiday shopping season.

Shoppers opted for the world of dot-coms to the tune of $531 million on Black Friday. For the month of November through Black Friday, consumers lavished $9.36 billion on those businesses.

2007 has easily outpaced spending for the same period last year. In 2006, the run-up to Black Friday including that shopping day reached $7.98 billion by comScore's reckoning.

Spending on Thanksgiving Day rose 29 percent from the same holiday in 2006. Consumers reached for their credit cards after their last serving of pumpkin pie and spent $270 million, a 29 percent rise over last Turkey Day's $210 million.

"Online spending on Black Friday has historically represented an early indicator of how the rest of the season will shake out. That the 22-percent growth rate versus last year is outpacing the overall growth rate for the first three weeks of the season should be seen as a sign of positive momentum," said comScore Chairman Gian Fulgoni.

Video games, consoles, and accessories more than doubled their appeal to shoppers on Black Friday. ComScore said sales for items like the PlayStation 3 and the Xbox 360 increased 134 percent from 2006.

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