The German interactive retail sector is expected to generate strong revenue increases duringthis year’s Christmas period with 70% of the country’s citizens planning to purchase their
Christmas presents online or via mail order companies, according to the German distance-sellingindustry association bvh.Bvh stressed that the continuously growing interactive trade promises high Christmas sales asmore and more consumers go for stress-free shopping.
The association’s latest survey conducted in cooperation with the CEG Creditreform Consumer GmbHanalyses the planned Christmas purchases of German consumers and the expenditures in theinteractive trade related to it. The data are based on a nationwide representative online survey ofpersons aged 18 to 69 years.
From the overall German population, around 50 million persons are currently counted among the “potential online-shoppers”. As many as 70% of those are planning to buy their Christmas presentsonline or via catalogues which equals 35 million Germans, the survey reported.
German consumers plan to spend between €288 and €466 on average in interactive shopping fortheir Christmas gifts. These online shoppers can be further divided into the categories “low-user”(40%) who want to spend €150-225 on average, “middle-user” (37%) willing to spend an average of€307-471 and “hard-user” (23%) buying Christmas gifts for €595-862 on average.
On average, shoppers want to buy 3.4 different products via interactive shopping. Above all,women and younger people as well as parents intend to buy more products than other groups, thereport specified.
The survey further revealed that the most popular product group during the Christmas shoppingseason is “Clothing / Textiles / Shoes” with 43% of the shoppers buying something from thiscategory. It is followed by the categories “consumer electronics/media” with 36% and “toys” with33%. Among the top 5 of the most popular product groups are also “computers and accessories” to bepurchased by 24% of the buyers and “vouchers” with 23%.
Bvh executive director Christoph Wenk-Fischer commented: “This year has been very strong forinteractive retailers in terms of revenues. By the end of the year, bvh expects revenue growth ofaround 7% for the overall interactive trade compared to the previous year. The e-commerce share isforecast to increase by 15%. The positive assessment for this year’s Christmas shopping season istherefore not surprising. Should the coming pre-Christmas weeks continue to run so successfully,the expectations of interactive retailers might even be surpassed,” he declared.
