An unprecedented disavowal for Amazon. The site could be less popular this year with the French for their Christmas shopping. This is clear from a study by the Bonial company, which every year surveys consumers about their intentions for the end of the year.
While in 2021 53% of consumers surveyed wanted to make some of their purchases on Amazon, this year only 47% said so, a decrease of 6 points, the largest of the entire Bonial panel. At the same time, E.Leclerc rises 4 points to 24% purchase intention.
Amazon remains a solid leader, but this decline is symptomatic of a tougher-than-expected year for the online retail industry.
However, with its low prices, its strong competition, its price comparison sites, the Internet had everything on paper to take the lion’s share in this period of inflation and stress on purchasing power.
A mediocre Black Friday
However, since the beginning of the year the opposite has been observed. In the third quarter, sales of online products fell again by 2% according to Fevad, after a sharp drop of 15% in the first six months of the year.
If e-commerce holds above its pre-Covid level, it looks like the wild years of double-digit annual growth are behind us.
This is demonstrated by the mixed success of the 2022 edition of Black Friday. So if according to Fox Intelligence the number of orders increased by 6% compared to 2021 during the 10 days that the operation lasted, sales fell by 2% on the main day of Friday, November 25. Another Webloyalty study is even less favorable. According to its panel, which brings together the 37 largest e-commerce sites in France, the total volume of purchases made on Black Friday would have decreased by 14% and the monthly volume by 7% compared to the 2021 period.
The drive performs a backup for the first time
Even more surprising, this disaffection with e-commerce also seems to worry the food sector. While hypermarkets, supermarkets and convenience stores should see increased turnover with inflation, e-commerce for food should be, according to NielsenIQ, the only channel that will not progress in 2022.
Self-service sales, which account for the vast majority of e-food commerce, should decline by around 2% in 2022, for the first time since the concept was created. According to projections by consumer specialist Olivier Dauvers, Leclerc Drive should fall by 2% this year, Auchan Drive by 4%, Chronodrive by 9%… Only Carrefour and Auchan would manage to resist, but with weak growth of 1%.
For the urban pendant of the unit, the route seems even sharper. After the euphoria of 2018 and 2019, the pedestrian promenade seems to be no longer successful. Carrefour and Auchan have almost stopped their expansion.
More restrictive legislation and insufficient demand have gotten the better of this concept.
Source: BFM TV
