Consumers Push Online Sales Up 20% in 2001

Online sales rose nearly 20% last year as features such as one-click shopping and enhanced security convinced more consumers to buy over the Internet.

U.S. consumers spent an estimated $32.6 billion online in 2001, compared with $27.3 billion in 2000, according to a Commerce Department survey released Wednesday.

Online holiday sales during the last three months of 2001 totaled $10.04 billion, the highest for any quarter since records were first compiled in 1999. The same period in 2000 brought sales of $8.9 billion.

The growth in online sales is due, in part, to merchants who have made it easier to shop online by saving billing and shipping information in Internet databases and adding one-click shopping features, said E-Tailing Group President Lauren Freedman. Consumers also have become more educated about the Internet and feel more comfortable shopping online.

“Once you get into it I think people get hooked,” Freedman said.

Despite a rise in online sales, e-commerce did not account for a much larger proportion of total retail sales last year. Online sales made up 1% of total retail sales in 2001, a 0.1% increase from the previous year. Total retail sales rose 3.3% in 2001.

Online sales during the last three months of 2001 accounted for 1.2% of total retail sales, rising slightly from the fourth quarter of 2000 when online sales made up 1.1% of the total. Total retail sales for the quarter were $860.8 billion.

Although online sales made up only a small fraction of the $3.2trillion in total retail sales last year, they have seen considerable growth compared with other channels.

Catalog sales, which have been around for decades, generated about $72 billion last year, Freedman said. Online sales reached nearly half that amount in 2001 after being around for only a few years.

“It’s fairly significant in a fairly short time span,” she said.

The online sales estimates--compiled from a survey of 11,000 retailers--do not include sales from ticket agencies, online travel services and financial brokers and dealers. They are not adjusted for seasonal, holiday and trading-day differences.