Grocery becomes major online retail category

Online grocery shopping has become a major category for online sales, according to a recent report by Adobe Digital Insights. 

The report marked 2020 as the “breakout year” for retail grocery: sales increased 101 percent over 2019 (largely because of the pandemic). It accounted for 9.1 percent of online sales that year, up from 6.3 percent in 2019. For 2021, grocery accounted for 8.9 percent of online sales.

Consumers now spend an average of $6.7 billion each month for groceries, which is over double the pre-pandemic level of $3.1 billion per month.

“E-commerce is being reshaped by grocery shopping, a category with minimal discounting compared to legacy categories like electronics and apparel,” said Patrick Brown, vice president of growth marketing and insights for Adobe. “It highlights a shift in the digital economy, where speed and convenience are becoming just as important as cost savings.”

Curbside pickup accounted for 20 percent of all online sales, the report said.

Total online sales in 2020 were $818.8 billion, up over 41 percent over $574.9 billion in 2019. The year-over-year increase for 2021 was smaller, at $885 billion, or 8.9 percent.

The analysts expect total online sales to be more than $1 trillion in 2022.

Inflation accounted for a portion of the increase in dollar value for online sales: in 2021, $22 billion of growth in e-commerce was due to inflation, up from $4.7 billion in 2020.

Adobe expects the value of online grocery purchases for 2022 to be 8.5 percent of all purchases.

In short, it would seem that online grocery purchases are likely to reach a stable 8-10 percent of all e-commerce in the near term. As e-commerce continues to grow, one could expect online grocery figures to increase accordingly.

How much of those increases will be due to inflation is a question that has yet to be answered.