Statistics

Unlike most European countries, local players generate the most online revenue in the Netherlands. The top 3 in online spending for 2023 is led by online department store bol. Supermarket chain Albert Heijn, a sister company of bol, takes second place, and electronics retailer Coolblue is in third. Amazon rises in the new ranking and claims fourth place.

The days of declining online sales in Germany appear to be over. Last year the net sales of the top thousand webshops fell by 0.2 percent, not adjusted for inflation, compared to a 2.8 percent decline in 2022. A nominal growth is expected for this year.

In the first half of 2024, Dutch consumers spent €17.5 billion on online retail, a 6% increase compared to the same period in 2023, although the number of products purchased declined. The growth mainly stems from services, such as health and damage insurance.

More than seven out of ten Belgian consumers never (or almost never) return items that they have ordered online. This is because they only order items that they want to keep. Belgians are ordering online more often, with 40 percent of all purchases happening online.

Mytheresa, the luxury ecommerce platform rooted in Germany, saw its revenue increase by 9.8 percent in the past fiscal year. Sales especially surged in the second half of the fiscal year, and profitability also improved over the course of the year.

The European online fashion, beauty and luxury market generated a turnover of 213 billion euros in 2023. The cross-border share of that market was 38 percent, representing 82 billion euros. The market is expected to grow.

The majority of Dutch online stores that sell products through dropshipping do not comply with legal regulations for online selling. Their websites lack contact details or information about returning orders, for example.

Online revenue in the Netherlands is expected to increase 8 percent this year, compared to 2023. Meanwhile, the total retail revenue will increase only 2 percent. This is due to an expected decline in supermarket sales, because of a ban on selling tobacco in those stores.

The environmental impact of retail, particularly the online sales of clothing, seems to be consistently underestimated. Between 22 to 44 percent of all returned clothing is never sold to a secondary consumer. These unused returned items have a big impact on the environment.

Next reflects on a successful half year. The British retailer has revised its profit expectations upwards. While pure players Asos and Boohoo, also from the United Kingdom, struggle to maintain their online sales, Next continues to grow digitally, especially abroad.

Of the 47 biggest online stores in Switzerland, only 17 percent offer free shipping this year. A majority of 64 percent offers free shipping above a threshold value. Another 19 percent always charges for delivering goods. These data are approximately the same as those in 2023.

One in three (34 percent) of online purchases in the first half of this year in Spain were placed on Chinese platforms, such as Alibaba, Temu or Shein. The market share (in terms of order frequency) of these platforms is far higher in Spain than in other European countries. However, Spanish consumers spent a lot less on these platforms than consumers from other countries.

Despite the rapid rise of Chinese platforms, Amazon remains immensely popular in the United Kingdom. The company has managed to maintain the number of monthly active users since the beginning of this year. Shein is growing, but Temu saw a decline in the number of users.

Despite a drop in revenue, Zalando remains the largest online retailer in Switzerland. The local online department store Galaxus, now the new number 2, saw its revenue increase significantly last year. Temu is the only newcomer in the top 10.

No country in the world has as many internet users shopping online as the Netherlands, according to a new report by the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD). The ecommerce penetration rate is 84 percent. At least four out of five internet users in the UK, Sweden, and Denmark also shop online.