Amazon.co.uk shipped more than 256 tonnes of goods on its busiest day - with a Royal Mail truck leaving one of its three distribution centres every 15 minutes.

Across the worldwide business, customers ordered 3.6 million items on its busiest day, December 12, equivalent to 41 items every second. More than 108 million orders were placed globally during the whole of the holiday season.

Its most popular book, Does Anything Eat Wasps And 101 Other Questions, sold more than double the number of copies of last year’s bestseller. Other top titles in the UK included Is It Just Me Or Is Everything Shit? by Alan McArthur and cook book Jamie’s Italy by Jamie Oliver.

Madonna led music sales with her Confessions on a Dance Floor album, followed by Now That’s What I Call Music! Vol 62 and Intensive Care by Robbie Williams.

Amazon’s consumer electronics division was dominated by sales of MP3 players and accessories, with the ILogic docking station for iPod music players the best-seller.

The company has been delivering gifts and products for free when customers spend at least £15 on its UK website, down from £19 last year, in a bid to combat tough competition among retailers.

The group warned in October that sales growth in the final quarter of this year across its global operations could be as low as 13 per cent - well below the 31 per cent recorded in the same period of last year.

Amazon.co.uk started life as independent online store Bookpages, which was established in 1996 and acquired by Amazon.com in early 1998.

Amazon was not the only online retailer to thrive this Christmas. According to Hitwise, the internet ratings agency, visits to Comet’s website increased 294 per cent, while rival Currys saw an increase of 279 per cent on Christmas day, as shoppers appeared to be checking out the prices of goods in advance of the winter sales..

Hitwise also reported that with MP3 players being popular Christmas gifts, visits to music websites increased by 50 per cent on Christmas day, as consumers sought to download tracks on their new gifts.

Play.com, the Channel Islands-based online CD and ring tones retailer, was the most visited among the music sites, beating Apple's iTunes and Sony's Connect.

Connect - ranked only 15th among music sites on December 25, 2004 - experienced a 1103 per cent increase in its market share on Christmas day, thanks largely, it is thought, to sales of its new MP3 Walkman.

Napster, MusicMatch, and Tesco Downloads all held places among the top ten music sites on Christmas day and all experienced significant increases in market share of visits that day.

The high level of traffic to online retailers confirms what many analysts had suggested when attempting to explain the apparent slow business on Britain's high streets in the run-up to Christmas.

Conventional retailers were at least delivered a post-Christmas boost today with a year-on-year increase in the number of shoppers on Boxing day, according to FootFall, the market-tracking agency.

FootFall's latest report showed that the winter sales drew nearly one-fifth more shopper visits compared to last year.

"Clearly, many consumers left their Christmas shopping as late as possible to try and take advantage of any last minute deals going", said Howard Archer, economist at Global Insight.

"Similarly, many consumers may now be looking to treat themselves and their families in the sales after being relatively restrained in their spending over much of 2005."

FootFall's 17.4 per cent figure would seem to confirm statistics released yesterday by John Lewis, who reported that this Christmas has seen an 11.7 per cent increase in sales over last year.

The department store group claimed that the boost in sales were due in part to an increase in demand for luxury goods such as high definition televisions and designer handbags.

The stockmarket reacted well to the news from the retail sector as it re-opened today following the Christmas break.

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