These products are driving the online sales boom during COVID-19
Consumer electronics are a global leader in online sales. Image: Unsplash
- Consumer electronics and household appliances are among the fastest growing areas in global online sales.
- They also represent a high proportion of overall sales.
- Food continues to lag behind.
Products traditionally associated with e-commerce are still among the fastest growing segments in global online sales, but other product categories are also moving online in rapid speed. According to the Statista Consumer Market Outlook, online sales of consumer electronics and apparel were still growing fast as a share of total sales. Around every fifth household appliance is also already bought online according to the data and that share is expected to grow to 31 percent by 2023.
Eyewear, which currently only has an online sales share in the single digits, is projected to catch up with more established categories by 2023, more than doubling online sales within the segment in six years. OTC pharmaceuticals, also a newer market for e-commerce, is expected to grow online sales almost as fast.
Food – potentially the last frontier for e-commerce – still has a long was to go globally. While some countries are already spending one in five dollars of their grocery budget online, the global share of e-commerce food sales is projected at only 3 percent of global food sales in 2023.
Don't miss any update on this topic
Create a free account and access your personalized content collection with our latest publications and analyses.
License and Republishing
World Economic Forum articles may be republished in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International Public License, and in accordance with our Terms of Use.
The views expressed in this article are those of the author alone and not the World Economic Forum.
Stay up to date:
Retail, Consumer Goods and Lifestyle
The Agenda Weekly
A weekly update of the most important issues driving the global agenda
You can unsubscribe at any time using the link in our emails. For more details, review our privacy policy.