How the European eCommerce market is developing: trends from Mckinsey

The European eCommerce market has been growing rapidly in recent years against the backdrop of social distancing. At the same time, this growth, according to Mckinsey analysts, differed depending on the region. In particular, in Northern Europe, online sales of consumer goods grew by an average of 19% per year from 2019 to 2021. It's about the same as in the US. At the same time, eCommerce penetration in the region is also about 19%.

In Southern and Eastern Europe, where the e-commerce market is still in its infancy, the pandemic has caused a sharper growth rate of eCommerce, about 27%, but the penetration of online sales here has not exceeded 10%.

The markets are also fragmented by the penetration of large online players. Thus, of the five leading retailers in Europe, only Amazon, eBay, MediaMarkt and Zalando are represented in more than two countries. Many of the leading online retailers are local omnichannel players with a significant offline presence.

Now the leading market players are redistributing development priorities, investing in modern ways to stimulate online sales. Thus, especially advanced retailers operating in such categories as fashion, beauty, DIY and goods for children have mastered new formats in the last two years, in particular, streaming and social commerce. At the same time, players in "younger" categories such as food and FMCG began to develop their own online games.

Experts are convinced that the most important element of communications with consumers now are the metaverses. "We estimate that by 2030, more than 80% of commercial activity may be driven by consumer behavior in the metaverse, from brand searches to virtual store visits," the report says.