India-based eCommerce focused SaaS platform, Unicommerce on Friday said, “During the festive season eCommerce industry has recorded 56% growth in order volume as compared to the festive season last year.”
Unicommerce’s new data-driven festive trend report based on the shopping trends for the festive month of 2019 and 2020. The period for analysis was 30 days before Diwali within the sample size of 44 mn.
Unicommerce in its report said, “This festive season e-commerce industry has reported 56% growth in order volume as compared to last year. This also led to the GMV growth of 50% compared to the last year’s festive season.”
“The rise of new categories such as personal care and beauty products and higher sales of lower value products has declined by 4 percent as compared to last year’s festive season,” the report said.
“One of the most promising signs for the e-commerce industry is the rising number of first-time online shoppers and the new emerging categories,” the report added.
“During the festive season, the Personal care category and Beauty and wellness category have recorded a 176% and 52% order volume growth as compared to last year,” it added.
“The fashion and accessories categories witnessed 71% as compared to the last year’s festive season. The electronic segment also saw a growth of 65% in order volume as compared to the festive month of 2019,” the report said.
“During the festive season, the e-commerce industry has also witnessed a decline of 35% in return orders as compared to the last year. Whereas, the fashion and accessories categories continued to record maximum return orders,” Unicommerce in its report said.
“The brand’s websites during the festive season have also witnessed a surge in consumer demand with 77% order volume growth as compared to 60% order volume growth of the marketplace,” the report added.
“The GMV for the brand websites has increased by 48%, while for marketplace it stood at 50 percent,” the report added.
Adding to the report, Unicommerce said, “The average order size on the brand website has decreased by 16% as compared to 5% dip for the marketplaces for last year’s festive month.”
“Compared to the metropolitan cities, the Tier II and Tier III cities have witnessed an increase in order growth. Where Tier II and beyond cities have witnessed a growth of 99% as compared to Tier I and metropolitan cities which remain at around 20%,” it added.
“The orders from Tier II and beyond cities stood at 59% as compared to Tier I cities that stood 41 percent,” the report said.
“States with metropolitan cities continue to be the dominating states with Delhi, Maharashtra, and Karnataka being the biggest drivers of e-commerce. These three states combined contribute ~55% of India’s e-commerce volume in the festive month,” the report further added.
Speaking on the festive season report, Kapil Makhija, CEO Unicommerce said “The festive season is the most important and opportunistic time of the year for the e-commerce industry. However, this festive season was particularly more special as the world continues to deal with the effects of the pandemic.”
“This festive month we have seen e-commerce grow beyond expectations, and it’s interesting to see the new emerging categories like personal care and beauty and wellness continuing their growth trajectory even during the festive season. With the rising consumer demand on brand websites, brands are now committed to going D2C and offering great deals to attract more consumers,” He said.
Further adding to the statement, Makhija, said, “We are confident that with the rising number of shoppers from Tier II and Tier III cities, the eCommerce industry will continue to see the growth momentum in the coming years. This report is another step in our continuous effort of providing valuable insights into the e-commerce industry and helping sellers to simplify e-commerce selling.”