GuardianUnlimited: UK shoppers most likely to buy groceries online

2001-02-02:

British consumers are more likely than any others, including those in

the US, to buy their groceries online.

According to a new report from Datamonitor, online stores have now

cornered 0.4 percent of the British grocery market, in comparison with

the 0.33 percent held by online grocers in the US.

Shoppers in Britain spent USD580 million at online grocery stores in

2000, and more than half of that was spent at Tesco.com, making it the

world’s biggest Internet grocery store.

The next most developed online grocery market in Europe is the

Netherlands, but Datamonitor expects that the highest rate of growth

in 2001 will occur in France, where all of the major grocery retailers

are planning web shopping services.

Buying groceries over the Internet is also becoming increasingly

popular in Spain, but it is unlikely to take off in Germany, where

tough price competition in the sector means that retailers cannot