The UK is something of a global leader when it comes to retail ecommerce. This year, only China will trump the UK in ecommerce sales as a proportion of total retail sales (41.2% versus 30.9%, respectively). The UK’s fulfillment and delivery infrastructure is, as one would expect, quite mature.
“The UK seems primed for a busier-than-usual holiday season, and the stress test of the lockdown will stand fulfillment and delivery firms in good stead to weather the storm of the 16.7% increase in holiday ecommerce sales that we’re expecting,” said Bill Fisher, eMarketer senior analyst at Insider Intelligence and author of our latest report, “UK Holiday Season Shopping 2020.”
Concerns about receiving orders in time for Christmas may have driven some of this early “loading” of holiday season shopping. So, too, might have consumers’ financial and economic concerns, fueled by the impending conclusion of the Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme and the continuing threat of redundancies.
Whatever the core reason, a third pandemic effect has shifted shopping earlier in the year. The “Black Friday in July,” aka Amazon Prime Day, was pushed back this year to October 13–14, moving the event much closer to the traditional holiday shopping period.
We expect global Prime Day retail ecommerce sales to have hit £7.76 billion ($9.91 billion) in 2020, with non-US ecommerce sales accounting for £2.93 billion ($3.74 billion).