‘Ecommerce in Europe grows 19 percent in 2017’

Ecommerce in Europe will increase by 19 percent during 2017, the Global Ecommerce Association predicts. Only in Asia, ecommerce will be growing harder this year. But with Europe having the highest internet penetration, the ecommerce boom in this region is all the more striking.

This is shown in the Global Ecommerce Report 2017, executed by the Ecommerce Foundation. It says that although the ecommerce sales growth rate is forecasted to decline, ecommerce is still growing in all regions with growth rates last year ranging from 1.45 to 39 percent. For the European part of its report, the Ecommerce Foundation examined France, the United Kingdom, Germany, Russia, Italy, Spain and Turkey.

Logistical performance highest in Germany

One of the things it found out, is that the logistical performance differs significantly per country. The score (which reflects perceptions of a country’s logistics based on, among other things, efficiency of customs clearance process, quality of trade- and transport-related infrastructure and ease quality of logistics services) is highest in Germany (4.23), followed by the United Kingdom (4.07) and the United States (3.99). Russia scores the lowest, with 2.57 points.

The Ecommerce Foundation also looked at the ease of doing business in a country. In other words, where the regulatory environment is most favorable for the starting and operation of a local firm. The UK ended on the 7th place, while Germany and France ranked 17th and 29th.

Europe has the highest internet penetration

Europe has the highest internet penetration, with 80.5 percent of the population using the internet. The lowest penetration can be found in Asia Pacific (46.6 percent). Although this needs some clarification: the region generally has extremely high internet penetration rates, but India and Indonesia’s low rates bring the average down substantially. When we look at the internet penetration rates per country, UK ranks first with 97.52 percent.

Ecommerce in Europe: 400 billion euros in 2017

The total b2c ecommerce turnover of the selected countries is expected to increase to about 1.56 trillion euros in 2017. The Asia Pacific region has the highest share of this ecommerce turnover, as it accounts for almost half of total revenues. Europe has a 25.64 percent share, with a ecommerce turnover of about 400 billion euros.

The Ecommerce Foundation also looked at which countries have the fastest-growing ecommerce market. Australia ends on the first place with a growth rate of 40 percent, but Turkey finishes on a nice second place, with 31 percent. Italy and Spain are also in the top five, with respectively 26 and 25%.

Another interesting thing about Europe, is that it has the highest ecommerce share of GDP, of all the regions. In Europe, ecommerce accounts for 4.91 percent of the region’s gross domestic product. The highest E-GDP can be found in the United Kingdom, where it accounts for 7.9 percent of the country’s GDP. In terms of e-shoppers, Europe is still far behind on North America. In Europe, 58 percent of internet users shop online, while in North America, it’s 70 percent of internet users.

In Europe, 57 percent of consumers first purchased something via their smartphone or tablet 1 year ago or longer. And now, 22 percent of consumers purchase weekly via their mobile device. Also, in this region 40 percent of consumers is extremely satisfied with mobile purchases. Especially in the UK and France, there are many satisfied mobile shoppers to be found.

European like to pay with credit card

Based on the information from the selected European countries, the bank credit card is the most used payment method (54%) in Europe. It’s followed by debit card (45%), PayPal (39%), cash on delivery (20%), bank transfer (11%) and gift cards (7%). Turkey leads in monthly online payments, with 44 percent of the population making online payments monthly.