Amazon Reports Strong Sales; Apple, Nokia, HP Were Best-Selling Computer Products

Amazon.com announced that 2007 was its best holiday season so far, with traffic peaking on Dec. 10.

Amazon did not report total holiday shopping figures, but said its customers ordered over 5.4 million items, or 62.5 items a second, when sales peaked on Dec. 10. The company said it shipped more than 99% of its orders in time for the holidays. Amazon's shipping peak saw 3.9 million packages shipped to more than 200 countries.

The company said it sold about 17 Wii systems per second while supplies lasted, enough high-definition DVD players to cover seven football fields, and enough auto wrenches to loop the entire Daytona 500 track. The Nintendo Wii ranked first for video game hardware sales through Amazon from Nov. 15 to Dec. 19, while Super Mario Galaxy and Call of Duty 4 rose to the top for game sales.

The Garmin GPS, Canon's PowerShot digital Elph, and Saumsung LCD HDTVs sold best among consumer electronics, while Apple's MacBook, Nokia's Internet Table, and HP's Pavilion Entertainment Notebook were the most purchased products in the PC category on Amazon, the company said. Amazon said it sold enough GPS units to make a path from New York to Philadelphia.

Amazon's top-selling DVDs included Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, Planet Earth: The Complete BBC Series, and Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End.

A "Prime" buyer in Virginia placed the last order on Dec. 23 through Amazon, receiving Futurama, A Charlie Brown Christmas, and Pulp Fiction DVDs, as well as Ayn Rand's The Fountainhead (paperback) and a Bridge Over Troubled Water CD, according to the company, which extended its one-day shipping this year.