E-commerce in Southern Europe to reach €47.8 billion in 2014

With projected online sales of €47.8 billion for 2014 and an average annual growth rate of 22% since 2010, the e-commerce market is a beam of hope for the crisis-struck Southern European region on its path out of the recession. Goods and services sold online in Southern Europe in 2013 amounted to a total value of €40.8 billion, making up more than 11% of the total online sales in Europe.

This is all revealed by the latest Southern Europe B2C E-Commerce Report by Ecommerce Europe, the European umbrella organization for 25,000+ companies that sell products and/or services online to consumers. Figures in the Ecommerce Europe reports are based on the Global Online Measurement Standard for E-commerce (GOMSEC).The European e-commerce figures were established in cooperation with national e-commerce associations and GfK.

48 million online shoppers
Southern Europe is fertile ground for online retail activities; of 125 million active Internet users, 48 million are buying goods or products online. At present, online retail of goods generates an estimated 2.0% of total retail of goods. The region, consisting of Spain, Italy, Turkey, Greece, Portugal, Croatia, Cyprus and Malta, realized a total e-commerce turnover of €40.8 billion in 2013. For the year 2014, an increase to €47.8 billion is expected. 

Spain leads the region
With total e-commerce sales of €14.4 billion, Spain is leading the Southern European region, ahead of Italy (€11.2 billion) and Turkey (€8.9 billion). With a growth of 18.9% in 2013, Southern Europe outperforms the European (+17.5%) and EU28 (+14.7%) average. Despite the fact that the growth of the Turkish e-commerce market is declining, it still grew the fastest in Southern Europe (+35.0%). Due to market saturation, the Turkish growth is expected to further decline to 17.8% in 2014, as a result of which it will be more in line with that of the other countries in the region. It is forecast that the Greek market will experience the strongest growth (+18.8%), just ahead of Italy (+18.2%). 

Greek e-shoppers spent most in 2013

On average, Southern European online shoppers spent €842 per person in 2013. This amount is significantly less than the EU28 average of €1,500 and the European average of €1,376. Last year, Greeks spent practically the same amount as the year before (€1,345 vs. €1,347 in 2012) but they were still the biggest online spenders of the region. Behind Greece, Cyprus ranked second with an average spending per e-shopper of €1,000, followed by Portugal (€954) and Spain (€874).

In addition to the Southern Europe B2C E-commerce Report, Ecommerce Europe publishes four other regional reports this period. These cover Central Europe, Northern Europe, Western Europe and Eastern Europe. The rapports are powered by GlobalCollect, Informatica, RichRelevance and Salesupply.

You can download a free light version of the Southern Europe B2C E-commerce report here.