Greek consumers hold the record for online shopping among Southern Europeans, despite the fact that both the Internet and e-commerce penetration in Greek households was relatively late. The economic crisis seems to have drastically changed consumer habits, as more and more people are looking for more advantageous solutions in online stores, both inside and outside Greece. According to a study by E commerce Europe (the European association of e-commerce businesses) on e-commerce in Southern Europe, the average annual expenditure of the Greek consumer on online shopping was 1,347 euros in 2012, well above the average for the region, which is 864 euros.
In second place are the Portuguese, who in 2012 spent an average of 979 euros, in third place are the Cypriots with 885 euros, while the Spanish are in fourth place.
However, Spain, due to the size of its population, is the country in which e-commerce turnover in 2012 was the largest in Southern Europe, reaching 12.9 billion euros. Italy follows with a turnover of 9.5 billion euros and Turkey is third with a turnover of 5.4 billion euros. Overall, e-commerce turnover in Southern Europe is estimated to have reached 33.5 billion in 2012, while for 2013, estimates so far indicate an increase to 39.5 billion euros. Since 2009, the average annual growth rate of e-commerce in the region has been 23%.
As the E commerce Europe study points out, the European South is a bright spot for the development of e-commerce, as penetration rates are still very low. E-commerce represents only 1.8% of total retail trade, while out of a total of 128 million active Internet users, around 40 million users shop online.
The growth of e-commerce in Turkey is impressive (90% increase in 2012 and 40% in 2013), something that Greek companies are certainly taking seriously. Skroutz's activity in the neighboring country, where it created an online price comparison platform, is a typical example.
In Greece, where online shopping mainly concerns airline tickets and tourist services in general, as well as technological products, online shopping for basic food items from large supermarket chains is also starting to gain ground. A pioneer in Greece in this field was Veropoulos, which for years has developed an online store, which is mainly preferred by companies for their purchases.
Marinopoulos and AB Vassilopoulos followed much later, chains that recently developed applications for "smartphones", where consumers are informed about store offers.
A few days ago, Marinopoulos' online store - in its new form - (www.caremarket.gr) celebrated one year of operation. According to the company, during this time, 15,000 orders were processed through the online store. The website received an average of 90,000 visits per month, while unique visitors amounted to 50,000 per month. Registered users amount to 18,353 and the average order is 130 euros.
Source: kathimerini.gr
