Macy's Website Suffers Disruptions on Critical Shopping Day

The Macy’s Inc. website suffered service disruptions on Black Friday, dealing a setback to a company trying to persuade customers -- and investors -- that it can handle more online shoppers.

Some visitors to Macys.com were shunted to a page citing “heavier traffic than normal.” A countdown clock tells shoppers when they can return to the main site.

“We are still taking a high volume of online orders, and we are working quickly to alleviate the delay issue, which we hope to have resolved shortly,” Holly Thomas, a spokeswoman for the largest U.S. department-store chain, said in an e-mail.

Macy’s is shutting brick-and-mortar locations, putting more pressure on its e-commerce site to deliver sales. It’s closing 100 full-line stores, out of a total of more than 700, and seeking partners to help redevelop some of its flagship locations.

With traffic at shopping malls slowing, more customers are seeking Black Friday deals on Macy’s site.

‘Heavy Load’

“They are under heavy load,” Kristina LeBlanc, a spokeswoman for the website-monitoring firm Catchpoint Systems Inc., said in an e-mail.

But even if shoppers have trouble on Friday, they’ll able to shop the same offers through midnight on Saturday, Thomas said.

Macy’s isn’t the only retailer facing technical problems.

The website for Victoria’s Secret, owned by L Brands Inc., also suffered delays, according to LeBlanc. And shoppers at Express Inc. and Pier 1 Imports Inc. have complained on social media about errors and slowness on those websites.

Express responded to angry customers on Twitter with messages reading, “We should be back up and running soon. We’re working hard so you can continue shopping!”