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Online retailer Amazon.com Inc. called this holiday season its "best ever," saying Friday that it saw a 17 percent increase in orders on its busiest day - a rare piece of good news in a season that has been far from merry for most retailers, including online businesses.

Amazon customers ordered more than 6.3 million items on Dec. 15, compared with roughly 5.4 million on its peak day last year, the company said. It shipped more than 5.6 million products on its best day, a 44 percent rise over 2007, when it shipped about 3.9 million on its busiest day.

The company did not provide dollar figures and wouldn't say whether the average value of orders had changed, and the jumps it reported Friday are in line with increases Amazon has seen since it started releasing the figures in 2002.

Amazon's best-sellers included the Nintendo Wii game console, Samsung's 52-inch LCD HDTV and Apple Inc.'s iPod touch.

Analysts agreed Amazon's report was good news for the online shopping giant, but they were divided over whether the results indicate strength in online commerce in general.

Forrester Research analyst Sucharita Mulpuru said Amazon's experience shows the current economy is favoring discount retailers, both online and offline.

"The Amazon story doesn't surprise me because Amazon has always traditionally been a leader on price, and they're one of the first places consumers go when they're looking for things online," Mulpuru said. "In many ways they're like the Wal-Mart of the online world."

Wal-Mart is one of very few traditional retailers where revenue has risen this holiday season over last.

Holiday sales typically account for 30 percent to 50 percent of a retailer's annual total, but rising unemployment, home foreclosures, the stock market decline and other economic worries led many shoppers to slash their shopping budgets this year.

SpendingPulse - a division of MasterCard Advisors - said its preliminary data show that online sales fell 2.3 percent compared with the 2007 holiday season, while retail sales overall fell 5.5 percent to 8 percent, including sales of cars and gasoline. The decline was 2 percent to 4 percent when auto and gas sales are excluded.

Online shopping may have gotten a boost from winter storms during last two weeks before Christmas, which made travel to brick-and-mortar stores more difficult.

And, although Amazon's orders rose, the company didn't say whether orders were, on average, worth more or less than last year. Spokeswoman Sally Fouts said the company would release revenue results in its fourth-quarter earnings report, due in about a month.

But she said this was Amazon's "best season ever."

Orders to Amazon on the peak day of its holiday season have jumped in the double-digit percentage range for at least the past 5 years, according to data released by the Seattle, Wash.-based company since 2002. Last year, Amazon's orders spiked 35 percent to 5.4 million at their peak, from 4 million in 2006.

Stifel Nicolaus & Co. analyst Scott Devitt said online retailers' sales tend to grow much faster than those of brick-and-mortar retailers, but he said that difference narrowed this year. That's in part because shoppers tend to go to stores for necessities and online for discretionary purchases, he said. And in an economic downturn, consumers focus on their most-needed purchases and cut back on more frivolous items.

Devitt said Amazon benefited from a vast infrastructure that allows for faster, more reliable shipping than most of its online peers offer. He called Amazon's announcement an "extremely positive data point" and said the company is "uniquely positioned to do well in an environment like this."

That environment has left many retailers in a tough position. NPD Group senior retail analyst Marshal Cohen said they will be forced in coming weeks to take still more drastic measures to drive sales and raise whatever cash flow they can.

Amazon's shares gained 34 cents to close Friday at $51.78, a 0.7 percent rise.

AP Business Writer Lauren Shepherd contributed to this story from New York.

Copyright 2008 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed

In Depth: How To Avoid Hidden Holiday Travel Costs

Chances are, you're headed to the airport sometime this holiday season, but not to visit a quiet, sandy beach (even if you deserve it).

Unlike travel seasons past, the upcoming one has more to do with visiting loved ones. In a Nov. 4 survey conducted by research firm Harris Interactive in conjunction with the Washington, D.C.-based Travel Industry Association, 71% of Americans said that spending extra money on travel during the holiday season is worthwhile--so long as it affords them time with family and friends.

But just because traveling may be the right thing to do this year, that doesn't mean it has to be the expensive thing to do. Traveling involves myriad hidden costs that, once you're aware of them, are easy to spot--and even easier to eliminate.

In Depth: Tips To Avoid Hidden Holiday Travel Costs

To start your trip on a frugal foot, consider transportation fees first. For example, if you're driving, fill up the gas tank before hopping on the highway, where it's much costlier, says Clarky Davis, a personal finance expert. According to NewJerseyGasPrices.com, a Web site that tracks prices across the state, on Friday at the Citgo Station at 86 Klockner Road in Trenton, N.J., a gallon of regular gas cost $1.61. At the Exxon on U.S. 130 South in East Windsor, N.J., a gallon of regular gas costs $2.59.

And make sure your car is in good condition by checking your heating vents, keeping up with routine maintenance and ensuring your tires are properly inflated, all of which help the car achieve optimum fuel economy. Furthermore, not only does a towed car cause inconvenience; it also means extra costs.

Small Costs Add Up
For those opting to fly, there are several ways to avoid extra fees. First, if you're driving to the airport, park in the long-term lot , which is usually just a shuttle ride away from the main terminal. While the short-term lot is usually closer to the terminal, it often costs up to $10 or more, extra, per day.

"Parking in the daily lot is tempting," says Davis, "but it's not worth it, even for a three-day weekend."

The Thanksgiving shopping weekend doesn't appear to have been the disaster some had feared, but tempered buying and unprecedented deep discounts likely resulted in soft sales. Now, online retailers are ramping up heavy-duty deals to turn skittish shoppers into "Cyber Monday" spenders.

"Cyber Monday," a term coined by the trade group National Retail Federation in 2005 to describe the Monday after the Thanksgiving holiday, is the unofficial kickoff for the busy online retail season.

The nation's merchants are struggling to entice financially strapped shoppers for the rest of the holiday shopping season, expected to be the weakest in decades. Online sales are expected to be fairly flat after years of strong growth.

"The consumer clearly is showing us that there is a holiday to be had, but the consumer wants bigger deals. And they are not panicking," said Marshal Cohen, chief industry analyst at NPD Group, a market research group. "They're willing to wait it out at almost any price."

Cohen predicts sales for the weekend, the traditional start of the holiday shopping season, were at best even with the same holiday weekend a year ago. The trade group National Retail Federation expects overall holiday spending will total about $470.4 billion, a 2.2 percent rise from a year ago and the slowest growth since 2002, and online retail is being hit along with brick-and-mortar stores.

If stores are already offering up to 75 percent off - a move likely to hurt profits - what more can they do? With mounds of inventory that merchants need to clear, Cohen said he expects retailers will be doing more two-for-one deals.

Still, the crowds that turned out for the early morning specials on Friday were a welcome relief to the nation's retailers - who since mid-September have suffered from the most dramatic falloff in spending in decades amid a ballooning financial crisis.

Yet Ten Sleep, population 350, is just as connected as any place these days, and home to a new company that is outsourcing jobs not from the United States to the Far East, but in the opposite direction.

Eleutian Technology hires people in towns across northern Wyoming to teach English to Koreans of all ages using Skype, the free online calling and person-to-person video service. Two years old, Eleutian already is one of Wyoming's fastest-growing businesses.

The company has close to 300 teachers hooked up to more than 15,000 students in Korea, and CEO Kent Holiday said he's just getting started.

"Our plan was never to be a company that had a few thousand subscribers," Holiday said. "It's a $100 billion market just between Korea, Japan and China, and so we wanted to be the leader and we wanted to have millions of users."

Holiday got the idea for the company after a short stint teaching English in Korea in the early 1990s. He went to work in Korea's telecommunications industry and eventually became a top executive of Korea Telecom (nyse: KTC - news - people ).

All along, he kept in mind that language education someday would be possible online. He made his move in 2006, getting grief from friends about quitting his high-six-figures job. "I said `You know what? The time's right,'" he said.

Classic Holiday Hairstyles. Since the holidays are well on the way here are the top classic holiday hairstyles to wear. When it comes to holiday hair its better to stick with classic styles that to try something trendy and new. This way you can look back and love the style you wore many years from now. However if you’re a trendy person you can try some of the more modern holiday hairstyles which I will be putting up later this week. For now here are the best holiday hairstyles you can wear now and for years to come.

Top Classic Holiday Hairstyles

• Sedu Hairstyles
• Updos
• Festive Hair Accessories
• Half Up Half Down
• Chignon
• Curls/Waves

Pictures of Classic Holiday Hairstyles