The Indian e-commerce ecosystem is estimated to have posted about 23 per cent increase in sales over the Black Friday weekend compared to last year’s Black Friday weekend, with fashion and beauty products ‘dominating’ sales, according to ecommerce enablement platform Unicommerce.

Websites run by individual brands saw order volumes rising by 28 per cent during the weekend, while marketplaces saw their order volumes expand 19 per cent, Unicommerce data showed. “While during the Diwali festive sales, marketplace growth outpaced D2C (direct-to-consumer) brands, the trend was reversed during the Black Friday weekend,” it said in a statement.

Unicommerce said the sale period also saw increased activity from beyond metro cities in India. While Tier-III towns saw the highest growth of all geographies with a 43 per cent surge, Tier-II towns saw a 16 per cent growth and Tier-I cities saw a 19 per cent growth.

There was a “noticeable uptick” in categories such as fast moving consumer goods (FMCG) and eyewear during the sale, it said. Customers extended their post-Diwali shopping spree” to continue buying during the Black Friday and Cyber Monday sales, the firm added.

Over 8.5 million order items demand received on the Unicommerce platform during the 2023 Black Friday sale weekend.

“Unicommerce received an average of 1500 orders of item demand every minute. More than 10 sellers received demand for over 100,000 orders items during the four-day weekend, and over 100 sellers received demand for more than 10,000 orders items through the platform,” said the platform.