Sales growth in the German e-commerce market fell by 0.2% in 2023, new research by the EHI Retail Institute and ECDB has found.
According to the E-Commerce-Markt Deutschland 2024 study, the stagnation in sales last year follows on from a 2022 in which a 2.8% decline in sales was recorded.
Online Sales In Germany
The study takes into account sales at the top 1,000 B2C online platforms in Germany, which reported combined sales of €77.5 billion last year, a decline of €164.5 million compared to the previous year.
This figure is not price-adjusted, however, so the rate of increase due to inflation is not taken into account.
'Levelled Out'
According to Lars Hofacker, head of the e-commerce research department at EHI, the current patterns indicate that the boost in online sales experienced as a result of the pandemic has "levelled out", and online is returning to the same patterns it experienced prior to COVID-19.
"For the current year, we expect moderate growth of 1.1% in nominal terms in the sales of the top 1,000 online shops," he commented.
Prior to the pandemic, sales across the top 1,000 online platforms in Germany had increased by an average of 10.7% per year since 2008, with the report noting that if this trend had continued, the sales total recorded last year would have been roughly on a par with the actual figure.
The largest online retailers operating in Germany are Amazon (with sales of €14.66 billion), Otto (€4.2 billion) and Zalando (€2.51 billion).
International players are also in the ascendancy, the study found, with Shein now Germany's 18th largest online retailer, with sales of €567 million, a 30.6% increase year-on-year. Elsewhere, Aliexpress recorded sales of €1.24 billion, a 43% rise.
