Web shopping grew over holidays

• Online shopping was the winner this holiday retail season, according to a report that says many traditional retailers will have to up their game in order to prevent Amazon and eBay from siphoning away sales in the future.

“E-commerce is becoming a more preferred shopping channel among Canadians as these digital platforms offer comfort and convenience for shoppers,” said the report this month from BMO Capital Markets analyst Peter Sklar, who compared share of Canadian Web visits during the holidays between online only retailers and bricks- and- mortar retailers with online divisions, such as Canadian Tire and Walmart.

“E-commerce platforms of the publicly traded Canadian bricks- and- mortar retailers, such as Canadian Tire and Rona, continue to represent an immaterial share of Canadian web visits during this past holiday season relative to Amazon, Walmart, and eBay,” Sklar noted.

Broader data also confirms that the holiday 2015 period was robust for online retail. November and December 2015 were recordbreaking months for online sales in Canada, according to MasterCard SpendingPulse, which tracks consumer payments and estimates for credit, debit, cash and cheques. Online sales accounted for 9.7 per cent of total retail sales in the twomonth period, the highest watermark yet for Web sales in Canada. In December, online sales accounted for to 9.9 per cent of total retail sales, up from 8.6 per cent in 2014.

In the meantime, overall Canadian retail sales growth, excluding automotive and gasoline, grew two per cent year over year over the holidays, MasterCard noted.

To gauge the potential future impact on sales of the Canadian bricks-and-mortar retailers, Sklar looked at Amazon’s list of top- selling items on Amazon. ca during the holidays.

Amazon Canada’s t op sellers during the holiday season were in the technology category, such as headphones, HDMI cables and television sets, but Sklar said it is inevitable the online giant will begin to encroach on the operations of legacy retailers.

Amazon’s list included items that wade into the same territory as Canadian Tire’s product offering: automotive items such as leather care kits, household goods such as vacuum cleaners, and sports and outdoor equipment such as basketball hoops.

“Although Amazon’s current categories do not substantially overlap with the Canadian publicly traded bricks- and- mortar retailers (except apparel), as the company continues to broaden its categories, we expect that at some point in the future, this will have a noticeable impact on a broader range of incumbents such as Canadian Tire,” Sklar said.