Global B2C e-commerce is expected to grow by around 16% this year, a slowdown on the high 24% increase seen last year, with growth led by Asia Pacific but also with strong rises in Europe and North America, according to the latest research by the Ecommerce Europe association.
"Global B2C e-commerce of goods and services continued to grow significantly last year. The actual growth rate amounted to 24% in 2014, which was in line with preceding years. As a result, B2C e-commerce sales reached $1,943 billion," revealed the association, which represents more than 25,000 companies selling goods and/or services online to consumers in Europe. This amounted to 2.6% of the world’s GDP.
"For 2015, the B2C e-commerce growth rate is expected to decline considerably, as the market is growing more and more mature. However, it will still grow by double digits (around 16%), resulting in a turnover of $2,251 billion."
Just like in the preceding year, Asia-Pacific was the largest e-commerce market in the world in 2014, Ecommerce Europe notes. Its total B2C e-commerce turnover amounted to $770 billion, which was higher than Europe’s ($567 billion) and North America’s ($522.9 billion). Asia-Pacific’s B2C e-commerce market even widened the gap as it is currently growing at a much faster pace than the others. In 2014, it grew by 44.3%, against 13.9% for Europe and 12.2% for North America.
"These large differences are interesting, especially when considering the region’s internet penetrations. Whereas in the more developed regions of Europe and North America, around 75% of the population is connected to the Internet, only 39% of the Asian-Pacific citizens are able to go online. In combination with the increasing income per capita and improving retail infrastructure, Asia-Pacific’s B2C e-commerce turnover is expected to rise even more strongly in the near future," the association highlighted in its Global B2C E-commerce Report 2015.
Despite the low internet penetration, Asia-Pacific still has the largest number of e-shoppers. This is because more than half of the world’s population lives in this region. In total, 523.1 million Asian-Pacific citizens purchased goods and/or services through the internet last year. In Europe, this number amounted to 273.9 million e-shoppers and in North America to 195.5 million.
"Unleashed Chinese e-commerce market”
With regard to average spending per e-shopper, North America is clearly in the lead. On average, North American consumers spent $2,674 online in 2014, compared to $2,070 in Europe and $1,472 in Asia-Pacific. However, Asia-Pacific is closing the gap. Its average spending per e-shopper grew by more than 26% last year, against single-digit growth in the other two regions.
“Asia-Pacific’s strong e-commerce performance is mainly due to the unleashed Chinese e-commerce market,” said the director of the Ecommerce Foundation, Jorij Abraham. “The online turnover of this e-commerce giant grew by 63.8% last year, and reached $ 538bn. With this, it increased its lead on the American e-commerce market, which grew by 11.7% to $482.7 billion.”
Behind these two major markets, the United Kingdom ranked third, with a B2C e-commerce turnover of $169 billion. Yet, in terms of average spending per e-shopper, the UK leads the way. In 2014, British e-shoppers each spent $4,082 on average. American online shoppers ranked second with $2,888, followed by the French with $2,126. China is somewhat lagging behind, but at $1,703, the average spending per e-shopper increased by more than 55% in 2014. As a result, China is closing the gap here as well.
Double-digit growth throughout Europe
In Europe, B2C e-commerce sales grew at double-digit rates in all regions, according to Ecommerce Europe research.
Western Europe online sales grew by 13.3% last year to €209.9bn and for 2015 an increase of 12.5% is forecast. "As a result, Western Europe remains Europe’s largest B2C e-commerce region." The UK leads the way in sales followed by France and the Netherlands. Ireland's e-shoppers rank second behind the UK with average spending of €2,967, followed by France, at quite a distance, with €1,600.
In Central Europe, which includes Germany, the B2C e-commerce market posted growth of 12.9%, resulting in sales of €106.6 billion in 2014. This was considerably lower than in the preceding year, when a growth rate of 23.3% was reached. In addition, Central Europe was the slowest-growing B2C e-commerce region within Europe last year. A growth forecast for 2015 was not published.
In Northern Europe, sales grew by 13.5% in 2014, compared to 10.9% in 2013. For 2015, a growth rate of 12.8% is forecasted, which will take turnover to almost €40 billion. Denmark is the biggest market in the region followed by Sweden, Norway and Finland.
In Southern Europe, sales were up by 15.4%, resulting in a turnover of €47.3 billion. For 2015, an increase of 13.5% is expected. Spain is the largest market followed by Italy and Turkey.
In Eastern Europe, the growth of B2C e-commerce sales declined considerably last year from 60% in 2013 but still reached double digits with a 16.8% increase. Eastern Europe thus still Europe’s fastest-growing B2C e-commerce market. Russia is by far the biggest market in the region generating sales of €19.9bn followed by Ukraine and Romania. The association did not publish a growth forecast for 2015.
Meanwhile, Ecommerce Europe expects the growth rate of North American online sales to increase by 12.6% in 2015. With turnover growth of 12.2% in 2014 it was still the slowest growing region in the world last year.
