NEW YORK (AP) — Super Saturday — the last Saturday before Christmas and usually ranked as the biggest or second-biggest sales day of the year — got walloped by a big East Coast snow storm that kept many shoppers at home.

And that spelled trouble for merchants, who had to depend on an even bigger spending surge in the final days before Christmas to meet their holiday sales goals.

Research firm ShopperTrak reported Tuesday that Super Saturday sales dropped 12.6 percent from a year ago, while foot traffic fell 12.4 percent, as a winter storm lashed the East Coast. The firm, based in Chicago, tracks total retail sales at more than 50,000 outlets.

ShopperTrak reported that Super Saturday’s sales totaled US$6.9 billion, compared with US$7.9 billion last year and US$8.7 billion in 2007. For the full weekend, sales slipped 2.1 percent to US$18.8 billion compared with a year ago.

“Mother Nature was very unkind to retailers on Saturday,” said Bill Martin, co-founder of ShopperTrak. He added that the sales decline was the steepest for the Saturday before Christmas since it started reporting holiday sales figures in 2002.

Martin had originally predicted that Super Saturday would be retailers’ second-most important day behind Black Friday, the day after Thanksgiving, but after analyzing the data, he said he thinks that won’t be the case.

He said he’s still sticking to his prediction for a 1.6 percent sales gain for the overall holiday period, forecasting shoppers will be out in full force in the final days before Christmas.

For the week ended Saturday, sales slipped 1.2 percent compared with the year-ago period, but showed a 20 percent increase compared with the previous week.

The International Council of Shopping Centers-Goldman Sachs index reported Tuesday that for the week ended Saturday, sales rose just 0.6 percent compared with the previous week.

Compared with the same week last year, the index rose 0.4 percent. A week earlier, that figure was up 2.4 percent.

Super Saturday turned into a “super disappointment” for retailers, said Michael Niemira, chief economist at ICSC. He noted that the catch-up will be “intense” as shoppers complete their holiday gift buying this week.

The measurement is based on sales at stores open at least a year, considered a key indicator of retailer’s health.