Christmas cheer for online stores

ONLINE retailers are set for another bumper Christmas, according to research by professional services firm Deloitte.

Deloitte predicts that online retail sales could increase by 15 per cent this Christmas, compared with total retail sales growth of around 1 per cent. This would take online retail sales in December to around 8bn, or 23 per cent of total retail spend.

Dan Butters, retail partner at Deloitte's Leeds office, said: "Online has been the great success story for retail over the past decade. Convenience and value makes it a particularly popular channel at Christmas when it is disproportionately important, more than doubling its annual share of total retail spend.

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"Next year is going to be tough for the retail industry as a whole, but online will continue to grow quickly.

"Therefore, it is critical that retailers get their online offering right. Growth will not be easy to come by and online is an opportunity retailers simply cannot afford to ignore."

In a survey of 20,000 consumers across Europe, 54 per cent of respondents in the UK said they would buy some of their Christmas gifts online, compared with 33 per cent of consumers across Europe.

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