Contrary to popular opinion, in a number of European countries Internet retail sales are surging this year; especially in the three largest European economies - Germany, France and Britain. Offline stores are performing poorly.
“Internet is booming at the expense of the high street stores,” said James Roper, chief executive of London-based online tracker Interactive Media in Retail Group (IMRG). “The story that we’ve heard in the past, that internet retail won’t take off because people want to feel the fruit and touch the cardigan is just not true.”
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n Britain, things are going along nicely, as online retail sales are projected to reach $7 billion by the end of December. Britain's traditional shopping season, which started Monday, saw £180 million on that day in itself. Double of how it started last season.
Germany had a huge increase of Internet traffic to its online retail stores, increasing by 63 percent over the week before.
With France, they had a strong bump as well, as Internet traffic grew by 79% in bellweather retail giant PPR.
We've talked here before about the significance that online comparison shopping can have on the marketplace; Europe shows the results. With consumers concerns over increasing housing prices, taxes, and rising interest rates, they've gone online to look for the best deals and have acted on them when they found them.
The result has been that brick-and-mortar retail stores in Europe have been performing below what was hoped.
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