Before, during and after the 2012 holiday shopping season, retailers were cautiously optimistic about how well they would do, as they felt consumers were hesitant about visiting merchants' stores and websites. However, the first sales figures coming in seem to be positive, as businesses performed well during the last part of the year.

USA Today reports that according to a study conducted by Retail Metrics, retail sales for December increased by 4.8 percent from the previous month. This beat the 3.4 percent rise that was forecasted. While not all retailers saw large gains during the month, there were others that experienced significant boosts in revenues, which resulted in the better-than-expected sales figures.

"A few retailers had a strong month and it really lifted the number up," said Retail Metrics president Ken Perkins. "That final week was stronger than most of us thought it was."

The news source states that retailers could continue to see strong sales throughout January, as people visit stores and websites to redeem the gift cards they were given for the holidays.

When it comes to same-store retail sales, December resulted in a 4.5 percent increase from the previous month, surpassing the 3.3 percent estimate by analysts, Forbes reports. These figures even beat 2011's totals, as December of last year saw a 4.2 percent monthly growth in sales.

This entry was posted by Retail Pro on Tuesday, January 8th, 2013 at 6:18 am .