U.S. e-commerce sales up 14.8% in Q1

By

Rebecca Taras

Published
May 17, 2017

As retailers continue to close brick-and-mortar stores, the U.S. Commerce Department just reported a 14.8% growth in the first quarter of 2017, raking in an impressive $98.06 billion dollars compared to $85.43 during the same period in 2016.

Retail sales as a whole for the quarter (including items like cars and gas, which are not traditionally bought online) totaled $1.163 trillion—a 3.7% increase ($1.122 trillion) from 2016. Eliminating the non-traditionally purchased items, as well as purchases made in restaurants and bars, total retail sales for Q1 were $792.09 billion. Internet Retailer estimates that this is a 2.1% increase from last year, implying that e-commerce sales account for a 12.4% piece of the entire retail sales pie for Q1 in comparison to 11.1% in 2016.

When omitting food and beverage services, cars and fuel, e-commerce sales justified 10.9% of total sales during the Q1 period compared to 11.2% last year.