23% of German companies active in ecommerce

Around one out of four companies in Germany, 23 percent to be precise, sold their goods and/or services through a website, mobile app or electronic data interchange (EDI) in 2016. The companies that were active online with an ecommerce website or app, generated 19 percent of their revenue through these sales channels.

This is the result of a survey held by Destatis, the federal statistical office of Germany. It also found out that the online share of sales is getting lower for companies with more staff. Micro enterprises, with less than ten employees, generated 26 percent of their total revenue through websites or apps, small enterprises (with 10 to 49 employees) generated 23 percent of their sales through these channels, and for medium-sized companies (50 to 249 employees) and large enterprises (250 employees or more) each saw 18 percent of their sales happen via websites or apps.

18% of online revenue generated through online marketplaces

The majority (82 percent) of revenue that was generated through websites or apps happened on the company’s own ecommerce website or apps, the remaining 18 percent was generated through online marketplaces, such as Booking, eBay or Amazon.

When it comes to online retail through websites or apps, sales to customers in Germany accounted for 81 percent of all sales, while sales to customers in other EU countries accounted for 14 percent.