The German distance-selling sector again grew at a strong double-digit rate during the thirdquarter of 2012, driven by a continuing e-commerce boom, prompting the country’s interactive
trading association bvh to raise its forecasts for the full year.Between July and September 2012, the German distance-selling industry, covering both traditionalmail-order sales and online shopping, increased revenues by 13.5% to €9.19 billion. E-commercerevenues reached €6.75 billion and accounted for 73.4% of the total turnover.
These figures exclude sales of purely digital products such as ringtones, music files, apps,computer software, electronic tickets and travel, which came to €2.65 billion in the July-September2012 quarter.
The first nine months of 2012 generated total distance-selling turnover (excluding digitalproducts) of €27.28 billion. E-commerce revenues reached €19.7 billion and made up 72% of totalsales in the January-September 2012 period.
Based on the nine-month figures and the experience that average sales during the fourth quarterusually grow by at least 20% thanks to the Christmas business, bvh now expects overall revenues for2012 to rise by 11.8% to €38 billion, compared to 2011. Initially, the association forecastrevenues of €36.5 billion for this year which would have equalled an increase of only 7.4%.
E-commerce sales are now predicted to soar by 26.5% to €27.5 billion this year, which wouldrepresent 72% of the overall expected revenues for the interactive retail sector. The bvhoriginally predicted 16.5% growth for German e-commerce this year.
bvh executive director Christoph Wenk-Fischer commented: “The third quarter of 2012 reinforcesthe impression that we already had from the first two quarters. The industry revenues continue togrow. The focus is now on the Christmas business, but we are already adjusting the expected figuresfor the whole year further upwards in view of the last nine months and looking forwards to asuccessful fourth quarter.”
In Q3, the top selling product group covering clothes, textiles and shoes had revenues of €3.23billion. The second and third largest product groups, covering media and consumer electronics, eachhad sales of €930 million, followed by computers and accessories with €630 million in revenues. Thefifth largest product group relates to hobby and leisure with revenues amounting to €550million.
The largest revenue increase during the third quarter of 2012 was generated bytelecommunication/mobile phones/accessories which grew by 116.2% to €240 million compared to €111million during the same period last year. This outstanding performance was followed by householdappliances with a revenue increase of 54.4% to €210 million and by groceries/gourmet food/wine with53.2% growth to €170 million.
