Poland is the fastest growing ecommerce market in the EU

Yeah, you read that correctly. Poland is the fastest-growing ecommerce market in the European Union. And Poland grows really fast, as in 2011 the country, compared to 13 other European countries, ended second-to-last in terms of percentage of retail business done online. And now, according to a report from the Centre for Retail Research, the ecommerce sector in Poland is growing the fastest of them all.

Being big in ecommerce is of course something different than growing fast, but the latter shows that things get serious and there’s no sign that the ecommerce market in Poland wouldn’t bloom. In 2012 Poland’s online sales grew between 25 and 30 percent year-on year, Warsaw Business Journal reports.

For those who are unfamiliar with Poland’s ecommerce market: Allegro is the largest auction site of the country and has more than 12.5 million users (for comparison: Poland has 38,4 million inhabitants) who last year did business with each other for 10 billion zloty (€2.43 bln / $3.17 bln). And that’s quite a share, as the total ecommerce sales in Poland reached 23.7 billion zloty (€5.76 bln / $7.51 bln).

One of the reasons ecommerce is doing well in Poland is because of the economic slowdown. Consumers are now more willing to look for cheaper prices. That’s why it now seems that the sector will grow strongly. There is a change that the growth will decline if the economic situation improves, but it’s also very plausible that when consumers are introduced to shopping online they will come back and do it even more.

Online shopping in Poland will possibly also rise because of the fact that more and more households in Poland have access to the internet. It’s expected that this number will increate to 75 percent by the end of 2015.

Alltogether, Poland is a very interesting country to watch out for. Big foreign companies like Carrefour (France) and Tesco (UK) now allow Polish consumers to buy online and let them pick their orders up at drive-in locations. Further more it seems like Amazon is opening a Polish online store. At this very moment Amazon.pl is forwarding to a Amazon Europe gateway, but who knows what happens in a few months…