Amazon is the undisputed e-commerce behemoth, generating about $53 billion in revenue in its most-recent fiscal quarter — nearly five times the revenue generated by Walmart.com.
Yet, new data from The NPD Group finds 29% of U.S. online consumer electronics dollar sales were made through traditional retailer websites for the 12 months ending in June. During this timeframe, the retailer ecommerce sites gained online dollar share over third-party ecommerce (i.e. Amazon) primarily in high average sales prices (ASP) for products such as TVs, PCs, tablets, and printers.
Average online spending per purchase was four-times higher on traditional retailer websites ($233/purchase) than through pure-play online retailers ($60/purchase). However, pure play online retailers are seeing an average of five additional annual purchases, when compared to traditional retailer websites, providing more occasions to sell.
Traditional retailer websites made up 46% of online U.S. consumer electronics dollar sales for these higher ASP items, up 3% from the prior-year period. For lower ASP items they make up 13% of dollar sales, as pure play online retailers still dominate this more ‘grab and go’ segment.
“Across the retail landscape traditional retailers are finding success in bringing what they do well in store to the online channel,” Stephen Baker, VP, industry advisor for the TNP Group, said in a statement.
Baker said traditional retail is competing effectively with Amazon and others for higher-priced items by leveraging their merchandising expertise and the strong in-store product selections on their e-commerce platforms.
“This approach is clearly paying off in the CE industry, as evidenced by growing online sales across a variety of categories,” he said.