The pre-Christmas business of the online mail order companies went much worse than in the previous year. In the months of October and November, sales in the industry fell by 16.8 percent compared to the same period last year, as the Federal Association of E-Commerce and Mail Order Germany (BEVH) announced on Monday in Berlin.
First decrease in the run-up to Christmas
That is the result of a survey of 40,000 private individuals from Germany aged 14 and over. For the first time since the surveys began in 2014, there was a decline in this two-month period. However, sales are still 13.1 percent above the level of the pre-Corona year 2019.
The deputy BEVH general manager Martin Groß-Albenhausen pointed out that online sales were particularly high in the previous year due to the corona restrictions. Added to this is the general slump in consumption. A decline in sales compared to 2021 is also expected for the year as a whole. “Apparel and consumer electronics in particular are falling, although the latter is usually a strong commodity category during cyberweek and the holiday quarter,” Gross-Albenhausen said.
Fashion industry back to 2019 level
The BEVH reported that the fashion industry was hit hardest by the decline. According to the study, sales in this sector fell by 28.1 percent in October and November compared to the same period of the previous year and were thus back at the level of 2019. The dispatch of everyday goods such as food, drugstore items and pet supplies held up better, the minus amounted to 8.4 percent.
The sales of stationary providers with online business fell by 29.5 percent in October and November compared to the previous year. According to the study, multichannel retailers could not have salvaged any of the growth from the past two years and also lost 11.9 percent in sales compared to the pre-Corona level.
More than half of traders pessimistic
Direct-to-consumer platforms also recorded losses compared to the previous Christmas business, but it is to be expected that the providers are expected to double sales compared to 2019 with a nominal increase of almost 85 percent.
More than half of the online retailers surveyed are pessimistic about the current business situation: 34.8 percent currently expect lower sales and 17.4 percent even expect significantly lower sales. 24.6 percent expect higher sales and significantly higher sales 4.4 percent. 18.8 percent of the BEVH members surveyed, who represent around 90 percent of online sales in B2C business, see no changes. (dpa/FashionUnited)
Editor’s Note: This post was updated at 11:30am on December 12, 2022 with additional information from the press release.