NZ Online Retail Sales - July 2018
HIGHLIGHTS
• New Zealand’s online retail spending in July was 13% higher than in July last year.
• Annual online spending across the retail categories we cover is now approximately $4.4 billion (excl GST). This is equivalent to 7.8% of total retail sales reported in Statistics NZ’s Retail Trade Series (RTS), comparing like-for-like categories. Excluding the food and
liquor sectors from both the RTS and our Index, online spending is equivalent to 11.2% of retail sales.
• Spending at local online sites was up 13% compared to July last year, well ahead of the 2% growth rate for spending at traditional stores. Two categories stand
out, and continue to drive a large share of the year-on-year increase in online spending at domestic merchants:
Food/Grocery and Electronic/Electrical.
• Online spending at international merchants was also up 13% compared to July last year. Compared to a year ago the NZD is down 8% vs the USD, down 9% vs GBP and down 3% vs AUD.
So, prima facie it appears that the 13% sales growth partly reflects NZ’ers paying higher prices; but underlying volumes
are still growing. Purchases from overseas computer stores were up 22% on last July; Entertainment Media sales were up
18%; and Clothing up 12%.
Reports can be downloaded here: www.bnz.co.nz/onlineretailindex
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