Online Retail News In Brief (12 July 2017)

By IMRG

In case you missed them, we’ve pulled together a few online retail news highlights from around the web this week.

Amazon Runs a 30-hour Prime Day

In case you hadn’t heard, we thought it would be remiss to leave this one out. Amazon Prime Day ran from 6pm on Monday 10 July. The 30-hour discounting event was the third Prime Day — the event began in 2016 as a celebration of Amazon’s 20th anniversary.

Amazon claims 37% of ecommerce spend, research claims

While we’re on the subject, research from Salmon suggests that 37% of global ecommerce spend is through Amazon. The research also suggests that:

73% of consumers say they will increase their use of digital shopping channels in the future
53% say they are more likely to buy through Amazon Prime than a retailer’s ecommerce store
60% of consumers said if a retailer was more digitally innovative, they would be likely to spend more

Spending at four-year low — Visa

According to research by Visa, spending in June was the lowest since Q3 2013, and overall spending in Q2 fell 0.3%.

While “face-to-face” spend decreased 2.4% year-on-year, online retail grew 2.9%
Food and Drink spend grew 2%
Spend on household goods shrunk by 3.4%

Tesco introduces contactless loyalty card

Essential Retail announced that Tesco has started rolling out a contactless card for its Clubcard holders.

The redesigned card was developed with Thames Card Technology, and has been issued to several million customers.

Full English Brexit

The latest forecast on Brexit is perhaps the most alarming.

The Retail Bulletin has reported KMPG’s figures, which suggest that if there’s no Brexit deal, the cost of a family’s full English breakfast could increase by 12.8%.

The figure is based on WTO tariffs. KPMG notes that imported food and drink would be among the hardest hit.

Pink pound – Pride week and retail

At the end of last year, The Hufffington Post suggested that LGBT shoppers have a UK spending power of £6 bn.

Pride Week 2017 was last week, and many retailers and brands have thrown their support behind it. At the risk of sounding cynical, and acknowledging the question of whether brands should do more or shouldn’t be involved, the event has clearly become a highly commercial opportunity. Just look at the list of sponsors for this year’s Pride in London.

Purple pound – Disabled customers want to spend

And on to another shopper-colour demographic.

The Retail Bulletin shared the ‘Help Me Spend my Money’ campaign by Purple. The initiative encourages retailers to make shopping more accessible for customers with disabilities.

“According to research from the Department of Work and Pensions, shopping, eating and drinking out rank in the top three most difficult experiences for disabled people based on accessibility. In addition, a study by the Extra Costs Commission found that 75% of disabled people and their families have left a shop because of poor customer service, and that UK businesses risk missing out on as much as £420 million a week through lost sales as a result.”