According to the Association of Internet Trade Companies (AKIT), the online retail market in the Russian Federation in the first half of 2020 amounted to 1,654 trillion rubles. According to the president of AKIT, Artem Sokolov, the development of e-commerce has become one of the main trends in retail, since the Internet has become the only sales channel for many product categories.
“According to the results of the first half of this year, e-commerce has almost doubled the first half of last year, that is, the market has doubled compared to last year with the same parameters,” said Artyom Sokolov at the World Retail Russia 2020 retail business summit.
The e-commerce market showed a sharp growth in March, the volume increased by more than one and a half times compared to February, from 205,8 billion rubles to 316,3 billion rubles. In April, in comparison with the March indicators, the market showed an additional 9,5% growth and amounted to 346,1 billion rubles. However, the volume of e-commerce has slowed down as the country left the quarantine. In May compared to April - by 9,3% (to 313,9 billion rubles), in June compared to May - by 11,4% (to 277,9 billion rubles).
“The three months in which there was COVID seriously affected the overall turnover of the market. This led to the fact that we have reached a historical indicator: the volume of e-commerce in the first half of this year in our country exceeded 10% of the total retail sales. We have never had such an indicator in our life, ”said the president of AKIT.
However, while the Russian market lags significantly behind the Chinese one, the share of e-commerce there is 29,9%. But the online trading market of the Russian Federation has already approached the United States (13,9%)
The association's data showed that clothing and footwear (30,2% of the local market) became the largest category in the e-commerce market, ahead of digital and household appliances (29,5%). In third place is the sale of food online, its share amounted to 14,1%.
“It was a trend that was impossible to miss. On the very first day, when the President of our country announced that a week of "days off" awaited us, in a number of food delivery services the number of orders increased fivefold, 10 times. Some of them had such a “overpriced” quota that, conditionally, the next order could be delivered only in a week and a half, ”added Artem Sokolov.
AKIT predicts that by the end of the year, the Russian e-commerce market will reach 2,933 trillion rubles. Last year, the e-commerce market, according to the association, amounted to 2,032 trillion rubles.