Retail and e-commerce - April 2020

Developments in retail
CBS reports that the Dutch retail sector achieved a 5% year-on-year turnover growth in February 2020.
The Rabobank (in Dutch) has published their monthly Retail Update of April (in Dutch, 660 kB) with insight in the most relevant developments in the Dutch Retail sector.
RetailX has published an Ecommerce Country Report of the UK and of Denmark. You can download the summaries after filling in your details.
New research (2 MB), “Powering the Future of Retail” by GS1 US has revealed that 82% of retailers and 92% of brand owners support a transition from the UPC code to a data-rich 2D barcode (e.g. QR code, GS1 DataMatrix), a digital watermark, and/or an RFID tag in the next one to five years.

Developments in retail due to COVID-19
According to FSIN (in Dutch), the Dutch Foodservice sector will lose €7.1 billion in 2020, of which the hospitality industry will suffer the bunt with a minus of 41.5%. Supermarkets will benefit with a €1.8 billion increase in turnover.
Since the outbreak of COVID-19 at the end of February, GfK has been charting a number of interesting trends within the various non-food markets in the Netherlands using weekly tracking based on retail data. In an article (in Dutch) the numbers for week 12 are presented.
Bevh (129 kB) has revealed that in March 2020 e-commerce turnover in Germany fell by almost 20% compared to the same period of the previous year.
Ecommerce Europe has published a new report (4 MB), covering the general situation per country and the overall effect of the coronavirus outbreak on the e-commerce sector, with a specific focus on the status of logistics in the various states.
A survey that Thuiswinkel.org (in Dutch) carried out among its members, shows that more than 50% of the members are struggling with fulfilment and delivery problems due to the outbreak of the coronavirus. 28% indicate that the problems may still arise in the coming period.

E-commerce and consumers
According to CBS, in 2019 58% percent of the Dutch population aged 12 years and over made use of online platforms to order or exchange goods or services.
DS Smith has published a report in which 5,000 consumers share their e-shopping experience. The report (in Dutch) can be downloaded after filling in your details (in Dutch).

Sustainability in E-commerce
Insights (1 MB) by Generation Investment Management show that online shopping at large retailers in the United States is actually more carbon efficient than visiting traditional stores.
PMMI has published the report ‘Packaging Sustainability: A Changing Landscape’. You can download an executive summary after filling in your e-mail address.

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