The number of New Zealanders shopping online has reached an all-time high, with over 1.4 million New Zealanders making a purchase on the internet in the past 12 months, according to recent research conducted by Nielsen. This represents an incremental incr
The number of New Zealanders shopping online has reached an all-time high, with over 1.4 million New Zealanders making a purchase on the internet in the past 12 months, according to recent research conducted by Nielsen. This represents an incremental increase of 2.4% on the previous year.
Nielsen has today released the findings of its 2010 Online Retail Report which shows that 45% of New Zealanders are now shopping online.
WHAT WE'RE BUYING:
Airline tickets: 51.1%
Books/magazines: 30.6%
Entertainment (concerts/tickets: 28.2%
Clothes/accessories: 26.8%
Travel services (hotels, car hire): 23.8%
Computer hardware: 13.4%
Music CDs/DVDs/Videos: 13%
Health & beauty products: 12.4%
Movie DVDs (not downloaded): 11.8%
Computer software (not downloaded): 10.3%
The overall increase in the number of online shoppers, while having stabilised somewhat over the last year, still shows very strong growth compared to 39 percent of the population at the end of 2007, and is close to double what it was five years ago (see chart above).
In addition, the biggest growth in online shopper numbers has been amongst those with high purchasing activities – more than one third of New Zealanders who shop online (35%) made six or more purchases on the internet in the past 12 months, an increase of 12.7% on the past year.
The most popular items purchased online in the past 12 months were airline tickets, books/magazines and entertainment tickets (see chart 2). However, in the top ten categories, entertainment tickets has seen the fastest growth in online sales the past year. Clothing and health & beauty items also enjoyed strong growth compared to last year.
The Nielsen report also highlights that a much more significant number of New Zealanders say that they would consider purchasing online in each category in the future than are currently doing so. This includes such categories as grocery shopping, home appliances, furniture, consumer electronics, collectibles and toys.
“We’ve again seen growth in the number of people taking up online shopping in New Zealand in the past year,” observes Tony Boyte, Research Director for Nielsen’s online division. “But what’s even more significant is that New Zealanders have strongly increased their number of online purchases within the year and are considering purchasing via the Internet across more categories in the future, which is a sign that growth in online shopping is really set to continue.”
