UK online orders grow 18% in August

By

Barbara Santamaria

Published
Sep 27, 2016

Online retail order growth was up 18.2% year-on-year in August, with 27.8% of all UK orders being delivered to international addresses, according to the latest figures released by IMRG.

“August is traditionally a slower month, so it is great to see delivery numbers swinging up again, and cumulative growth back on track. Despite our concerns about the effects of the European Referendum, overseas shoppers are taking advantage of the strength of Sterling which is boosting overseas deliveries with the added bonus that we are seeing a rise in order values from cross-border shopping,” said Kees de Vos, chief product officer at MetaPack.

For the first time in the history of the IMRG MetaPack UK Delivery Index, more people preferred the ‘next day’ delivery option, which accounted for 36.7% of all orders, while the standard ‘economy’ option stood at just 33.8%.

“We’ve been tracking a general increase in the percentage of ‘next day’ orders for a while now, and in August it became the most popular option domestically for the first time,” commented Andrew Starkey, head of e-logistics at IMRG.

“There are a number of factors potentially influencing this – some retailers see delivery as a differentiator and are offering next day as standard, others offer it if the customer’s basket value is above a specific threshold and for others the charge for next day is smaller than it has been on average in previous years. A move toward faster delivery is not unexpected and, for carriers, it doesn’t represent a capacity issue during most of the year – but during peaks such as the Black Friday period, promotion of next day delivery should be handled more cautiously.”

IMRG also reported earlier this month that online sales grew by 16% in the UK in August, totalling £9.8 billion.