Bumper Christmas ahead despite slowing online shopping

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The latest online retail figures suggest that, while problems associated with the Northern recent Rock financial crisis and the Royal Mail postal strikes have dented performance, e-retailing is still on course to break records this Christmas.

The Interactive Media In Retail Group (IMRG) Capgemini e-Retail Sales Index today released figures predicting a new record of £15-billion worth of sales for the fourth quarter of 2007 (October to December).

The record-breaking prediction is 60 per cent higher than the £9.6 billion recorded during the same period last year, despite the fact that online shopping growth slowed by 13 per cent in October compared to the previous, July to September 2007 period.

The average annual growth in e-retail sales doubled in October 2007 to 62 per cent, compared to 30.3 per cent in the same period last year. But this was lower than the growth experienced in the previous three-month period, at 71.3 per cent.

Despite the small slowdown, October's Index found the online shopping sector grew more than twice as fast as it did at this time last year.

Jo Evans, IMRG managing director said: "October's [figures] shows there is no sign of the online shopping boom petering out, even when other factors impact overall shopping trends."

And she added that with internet shopping sales still growing 20 times faster than High Street sales - estimated to be worth just under £1 billion per week - any traditional 'bricks-and-mortar' retailers who do not have an online presence are effectively seeing their available market share eroded.

Also, the average annual growth rate in this sector for the year to date (January to October 2007) has been 52.5 per cent, compared with 36.1 per cent in the same period in 2006, with total e-retail sales for the first ten months of 2007 worth £35.7 billion, with £4.4 billion being spent during the whole of October 2007.

David Walmsley, John Lewis Direct head of e-commerce said: "October showed continued strong growth for johnlewis.com, significantly higher than the previous year."

He said a revamped website, revised marketing activity and strong merchandising drove its positive performance.

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