Window(s) shopping has got a whole new meaning this holiday season ? where shoppers are logging on to snatch the best deals. And if you were thrilled at your favourite stores offering a flat 50% off, there are better deals available on the Net on a host of websites, which offer up to 80% discount, besides, of course, the comfort of shopping from home.

    Lucknow resident Harshita Singh’s Christmas gift came from one such website?a D&G watch at a whopping discount, and that, too, delivered right at her doorstep. For 25-year-old Delhiite Vivek Khaitan, some online shopping saved him from a dull New Year. He not only managed party vouchers to a popular pub at a 40% discount, but also access to the VIP lounge.

   It’s early days, but clearly the new-age e-commerce sites using discounts as arsenal are gaining traction with both investors and consumers. While Fashion and You raised $8 million from Sequoia Capital early this month, last month Accel India Venture Fund and Helion Advisors invested $2.8 million in Exclusively.in. Some others such as 99 Labels are close to raising private capital.

   Most of these sites are not more than a year old and have made the best use of their first year-end sales. A look at the number of members and transactions that these websites are registering gives an idea about the increasing online pie, though most sites are reluctant to share their turnover figures as they are privately held.

   Deals and You claims to have a transaction every minute, and claims to have a pool of 6 lakh members. Similarly, SnapDeal claims it adds 10,000 new members everyday to its subscriber base of one million. Fashion and You ships out almost 2,000 products a day, which is up from 1,500 a day average of last month. Similarly, 99 Labels boasts of 600-1,200 transactions per day.