The Apple Watch is surprisingly popular with holiday shoppers

Every year, holiday shoppers practically (or literally) trip over each other to get their hands on the latest Apple products, and it looks like the Apple Watch is no exception. According to FBR Capital Market’s analyst Daniel Ives, consumers are becoming more interested in Apple’s smartwatch as the holiday shopping season heats up, and many of them are more than willing to pay $350 for the cheapest version of the device. 

The Apple Watch is “showing signs of life” heading into the holiday shopping season, according to channel-checks by FBR Capital Market’s analyst Daniel Ives. With Black Friday underway and a continued shopping fervor still ahead, Ives writes in a note to investors this morning that observations at various Apple store as well as Target and Best Buy show customer interest — and willingness to shell out at least $349 for the cheapest version of the watch — ramping up. Target even called out the Apple Watch as one of the three items that helped it achieve record-breaking online sales on Thanksgiving. This report follows many others indicating that Apple’s smartwatch wasn’t selling as well as Wall Street had hoped. Price and the newness-factor have reigned as two reasons for why people have chosen not to take the plunge. FBR analysts pegged total Apple Watch sales at roughly 6 million so far, while research firm Canalys estimated a slightly rosier 7 million earlier this month. But FBR sees the holiday season alone ringing in between 5 million and 6 million additional units sold.