Online retail sales record lowest-ever growth
- Online retail sales fell by 19.8% Year-on-Year (YoY) last month – the lowest recorded growth in 21 years of the Index
- Though Month-on-Month sales grew by 40.4%, this was significantly lower than the 50% growth that is expected for this time of year
- November’s result was slightly below the 3-month (-14.97%) and 6-month (-12.64%) averages, but heavily so for the 12-month average (+6.30%)
- Every category, bar clothing, saw double-digit negative fall
As the threat of Christmas lockdown drove consumers out of their houses to socialise and shop last month, online retail sales recorded their lowest ever growth – falling by a staggering 19.8% Year-on-Year (YoY).
That is according to the latest IMRG Capgemini Online Retail Index, which tracks the online sales performance of over 200 retailers. While this does compare to a strong November 2020 (+36.2%), the Month-on-Month (MoM) figures were equally negative – showing a rise of only 40.4% versus the 50% that would typically be expected for the October to November timeframe.
Digging into the results further, there is evidence that consumers are both buying less often and spending less when they do, with the conversion rate down by 20% YoY to 3.3% and average basket value (ABV) falling to £123 (versus its 2021 peak of £149). With high street sales up, it is perhaps unsurprising that of the retailer types, multichannel brands suffered the most – with their sales plummeting by 23.4% compared to only -13.4% for online only retailers.
Meanwhile, every category bar clothing saw double-digit negative drop – with gifts in particular down a huge 46.4%. In a month where previously Black Friday spend would be focused on electricals, that category recorded the second lowest result at -29.2%.
Says Lucy Gibbs, managing consultant – Retail Lead for Analytics & AI, Capgemini:
“The drop in online sales this year is not unexpected. However the Month-on-Month figures suggest that spending overall has been even more subdued. Multichannel retailers were hit the hardest, down 23.4%, but online only retailers also suffered, down 13.4% due to the drop in overall traffic online.
“While a return to in-person shopping has taken a large share of the spend, other factors such as supplier shortages and delivery disruption have also caused retailers to spread and dilute some of the offers, which could be behind the decrease in conversion by 20% across November.”
Adds Andy Mulcahy, strategy and insight director, IMRG:
“In retail we are often prone to focusing on the negatives, but there is no escaping that November’s performance was very poor. The most concerning thing is that traffic was the problem, shoppers were just not visiting retailers’ sites in their usual volumes. To an extent, that could be explained by people taking to big high street locations again, but the next few weeks will be very interesting in that respect.
“There does seem to be an attitude of ‘getting it in before we get locked down’ at the moment, but from next week people will not want to go anywhere to avoid having to isolate over Christmas. We will, from a retail perspective, be in a lockdown in all but name which will really skew trading figures.”
