Online retail sales in Germany grew by 12% to €46.9 billion in 2015, according to figures released today by e-commerce association bevh.
The €46.9 billion figure represents nearly 90% of the country’s overall €52.4 billion interactive sales sector, covering e-commerce and traditional mail-order sales.
The association said the e-commerce figure confirms its forecast of 12% growth for 2015 which it made last March when it also predicted an overall increase of 5% to €51.6 billion for the interactive trade sector. The €52.4 billion overall total thus indicates that the declining mail-order business performed somewhat better than expected last year.
The association, which represents online retailers and mail-order firms, has not yet released any figures for the peak Christmas season but in mid-December it said that the German online retail sector increased sales by 13.6% to €9.6 billion in the first nine weeks of the fourth quarter of 2015 (October – November).
“With our large-scale consumer study ‘Interactive Trade in Germany 2015’ we report reliably on the sector’s development. Our forecast from last year has been fundamentally confirmed,” said bevh executive director Christoph Wenk-Fischer.
In 2014, German e-retail sales increased by 7% in 2014 to €41.9 billion, while the overall interactive retail sector increased sales by just 2% to €49.1 billion.
The bevh figures, which include VAT, are based on an ongoing year-round survey of 40,000 consumers about their online shopping behaviour. The association will present detailed figures for 2015 on February 16.
