As the Consumer Goes, How Goes eCommerce?

The Federal Reserve released its Q1 GDP economic growth number today, indicating that the first of two quarters of negative growth necessary to trigger the technical definition of a recession did not open 2008. However, there is evidence that the consumer pullback that has been all but inevitable took another step. Consumer spending rose just 1%, the lowest level since the second quarter of 2001, and less than half the 2.3% that it rose in Q4 '07.

This morning (May 1st), the Commerce Department released lagging consumer spending numbers for the month of March. At first glance, the number is up 4%, but when you strip out inflation, that number falls to just 0.1%.

The litany of issues facing the American consumer continues to grow - rising fuel, food and other prices, falling home values, and increasing credit card rates - and those factors place pressure on the American consumer's ability to drive the economy forward.

This may not be as bad for ecommerce shopping if last year's experience is any guidance, but we're still waiting for new data from Comscore on Q1 online shopping.