E-Commerce in Spain

The decrease in consumption capacity, travel limitations and social distancing could lead to a reduction in online sales in the second half of the year in some sectors such as travel, flights and entertainment, which currently represent 31% of total electronic transactions.

This decline, according to Minsait, could range from -30% to -50% online sales in 2020 for these activities.

In addition to these factors, the collapse of some food operators’ online ordering platforms during the pandemic, high lastmile costs and customer return rates have absorbed much of the margins, making this type of channel less profitable.

However, other sectors such as food, sports, women’s personal care and school supplies, which have grown by 80 to 200 per cent during the crisis, will be strengthened.

The following factors must be added:

• The emergence of new users: over 60 years old, who will break the barrier of digitization.
• The loyalty of those who are already online shoppers.
• The social value that this channel has acquired by being the only means of purchasing some products during the quarantine period.

According to a survey carried out by Kantar of 30,000 consumers in more than 30 countries, 1 in 2 Spaniards declare that they have bought less in physical stores and 16% have bought more online (almost twice as much as worldwide).

However, the future intention to buyonline is lower in our country compared to the global average (18% compared to 32%) and most Spaniards (51%) think that during the next month their level of online purchase will remain as it is now.

The collapse of websites, stock-outs and the consequent delay in product delivery during the lock-down period have been some of the reasons for this attitude.

In order to face this new scenario, the online sector will define action points oriented to explore the opportunities in retail and mass consumption.

To this end, Savills Aguirre Newman expect the following developments to emerge:

1. More versatile e-commerce platforms.
2. Own distribution channels.
3. “Last mile” logistics models.
4. Reinforcement and extension of the distribution models.
5. Redefinition of store to store logistics and mixed distribution models.
6. Consolidation of Flagship models.
7. Extensive use of big data to explore new opportunities.

Taking into account that, according to Kantar’s survey, 18% of online shoppers will increase their spending level by 50%, and that the rest of the shoppers will maintain their current spending, we obtain that the market share of online commerce, as opposed to the physical channel, will vary in 2020 from 7% to 8%, which implies an increase in sales of 27% with respect to 2019.

It is worthwhile to continue exploring the two points of connection between the different purchase channels and those that generate the so-called “halo effect”: the collection or return of the product purchased online in the shop, or the so-called BOPIS (Buy online Pick In Store) where the product purchased online is bought in the shop.

The implementation within the shopping centre of common click & collect stands for all tenants, in which the centre acts as the last mile, and in which the experience plays an important role with rest areas, TV screens, draws, specific offers can be elements present in these spaces for collecting products bought online.