In Germany, e-commerce sales fell 10.8% from July to September, excluding inflation, according to the latest data from bevh, an e-commerce industry association.
German online retailers posted total sales of €19.8 billion in the third quarter of 2022, down 10.8 percent from the same period last year, adjusted for inflation. “Even if there is still a small increase in the product group, this is at best the result of an overall price increase,” explains Martin Groß-Albenhausen, deputy managing director of bevh.
According to Bevh, an average of 30.1 percent of consumers in the third quarter of 2022 said they “want to spend less money on online shopping” compared to last month. It was 26.6 percent in the second quarter, compared with 18.4 percent in the first quarter.
Individual industry data suggest consumers are now postponing or rescheduling nonessential spending and big purchases. Sales in the “flower art DIY”, “auto and motorcycle accessories”, “footwear” and “jewelry and watches” segments have been falling by more than 20 percent. The drug and food sectors rose in nominal terms on inflation, but the results were even worse when inflation was taken into account.
Multi-channel retailers suffered the biggest loss, with sales down 21.5 per cent, but D2C sales down only 2.5 per cent. On the current woes, bevh stated that they do not represent a structural crisis for the industry, as e-commerce retail sales in the first three quarters of 2022 were still 27.3% higher than pre-Covid-19 (and pre-Ukraine war) levels in 2019.
Post time: Oct-08-2022