Sales of food and personal care are going well in European ecommerce and are set to increase by 54 percent in the next years. This means the online food and personal care industry will be worth over 56 billion euros by 2022.

The French supermarket chain Auchan will open its first cashier-less concept in Europe next month. In Villeneuve d’Asq, a commune in the Nord department in northern France, a fully automatic point of sale that can be operated via the smartphone will open its doors.

Online furniture retailer Made has announced that its sales in the United Kingdom hit the 100 million pound mark for the first time last year. In its home country, sales grew 34 percent, while international figures went up by 40 percent. The company will expand to several countries across Europe this year.

Deutsche Post DHL will be focusing more and more on the network of Packstations it has across the country and less on innovations such as delivery robots and parcel boxes installed at customers' homes.

Even though the "Yellow Vest" protests in the last two months of 2018 took their toll, ecommerce in France has managed to increase by 13.4 percent last year. The online retail industry of France was worth 92.6 billion euros at the end of last year.

The volume of retail sales via mail order houses or the internet keeps on growing in Europe. In 2017, the figures show a year-on-year increase of 12 percent in the European Union. Estonia showed the largest annual growth, while there were falls in Finland and Portugal.

Things aren't looking good for online retailer Lesara. The insolvent ecommerce player is searching for investors and it almost got one interested to take over. But at the last minute, that investor dropped out. Now, the inventory will soon be on sale and there are several parties interested in acquiring Lesara's logistics center.

Swiss online furniture retailer Beliani not only wants to sell its entire range of around 3,000 pieces of furniture, the company also wants to rent them out. With this initiative, Beliani is responding to the upcoming subscription culture, in which more and more people rent stuff instead of buying it.

The Danish company Traede, which offers a B2B sales system for brands, has received 3.5 million Danish kroner (about 470,000 euros) in funding from SEED Capital, the country's largest early stage venture fund. Previously it received about 400,000 euros from Markedsmodningsfonden.

The 'Freien Demokraten' from the city counsil of the German city Wuppertal asked for the Wuppertaler Stadtwerke, the city's municipal utility, to stop its online store in which it sells household appliances and energy-saving lamps. The ecommerce site is said to hurt the local retail industry.

Swedish startup iFoodbag developed an eponymous product which could revolutionize the online grocery industry. The iFoodbag is a temperature-controlled packaging solution that can protect chilled and frozen goods for up to 24 hours. With this, shopping online for groceries should be easier, as customers can now order products like frozen meat without any hassle.

Ecommerce Europe has finally started the rollout of its pan-European trustmark. Starting today, more than 10,000 certified online stores can join the Ecommerce Europe Trustmark for free. By establishing one European set of rules, Ecommerce Europe wants to further stimulate cross-border ecommerce in Europe.

More and more Spanish consumers are purchasing toys via the internet, as the online sales of toys in Spain has increased by almost 60 percent last year. In this industry, ecommerce shows a significant higher growth rate than the physical retail.

Amazon has launched its restaurant delivery service Amazon Restaurants in Europe. It introduced the service in London where it will compete with players such as Deliveroo and Hungry House. Prime Now users can order from several restaurants and have the meal delivered to them within an hour.

The Brits have voted for Brexit, which means the United Kingdom will withdraw from the European Union. The whole process of withdrawal will probably take two years, but it's certain Brexit will affect the European ecommerce industry. Here's how.