Thanksgiving might have the last Thursday of November, but Amazon (AMZN) has undoubtedly monopolized Cyber Monday. More specifically, the limited time offer deals–also known as “Lightning Deals”–that Amazon offers have taken the day dedicated to binge shopping and discount scouting to a new level.
While stores like Best Buy and Walmart have cut prices and enticed shoppers with free shipping, Amazon’s deals hit shoppers with a higher dose of adrenaline by offering sweet, limited time deals. Sure, you could get up to 800 Kindle books for $4.99 or a pair of Bushnell binoculars for $9.75 all day long, but for only a couple hours, you could snatch up a Toshiba Chromebook for 85 percent off. Both the price and the time have to be right for a selected number of items.
Although Black Friday has been a fixture of Thanksgiving weekend much longer than Cyber Monday has been, more consumers shopped online over the weekend than in stores, according to USA Today. In the past four days, 102 million people said they took advantage of the in-store discounts, while 103 million shoppers opted out of in-store purchases in order to shop in the comfort of their own homes.
With countless retailers slashing prices today, many find competition in the best deals. But do deals on tech gear and trendy fashions become sweeter when they’re offered for a mere hour? The countdown underneath each limited-time item on Amazon.com is both stressful and exciting. Better yet, seeing that 83 percent of the item’s inventory has already been purchased is just that much more appealing, right?
“Deal of the day” is a tagline that embodies Cyber Monday and all those consumers who look forward to finding some great deals without stepping foot in a packed shopping mall. But the deal of the hour–the lightning deals–are the pillars of what Cyber Monday truly represent for those who live to seek out the best prices. Now that’s something to be thankful for.