SAN FRANCISCO: Amazon dominated the US holiday shopping season once again in 2016, according to a new study that found the e-commerce giant generated about ten times more online revenue than its nearest rival.
Based on analysis of more than 1.3m digital shopping receipts, research firm Slice Intelligence found Amazon accounted for 38% of online sales from the beginning of November to 29th December.
That was up slightly from the 37.9% share it took in 2005, but this year's figures confirmed once more the extent to which the company attracts US online shoppers.
Best Buy, which again came second in the rankings compiled by Slice, secured just 3.9% of US online revenues over the same period.
The other major retailers to benefit from US holiday shoppers included Target (2.7%), Walmart (2.6%), Macy's (2.4%), Apple (2.4%), Nordstrom (2.3%), Kohl's (1.6%), Home Depot (1.1%) and J. Crew (0.9%).
Apple, bolstered by its new Apple Watch and MacBook, was the fastest-growing merchant this holiday season with 66% growth over last year, while Lowe's – not included in the top 10 – had the second-highest growth of 58%.
Walmart, Macy's, Nordstrom and J. Crew all witnessed small falls in their share of this holiday season's online shopping revenues, although total online sales across all retailers covered in the report increased by a fifth (20%).
According to Slice, Amazon made significant headway in the final stretch of the holiday season as consumers turned to its Prime Now business to secure reliable deliveries. It said Prime Now accounted for 13% of Amazon's US sales from 16-25 December 2016, compared with 10% in 2015.
"2017 is clearly becoming the year [once again] that Amazon's competitors have no choice but to think differently in order to counter Amazon’s dominance in the e-commerce channel," the report concluded.
"It may finally be evident to all that Amazon is an existential threat that warrants very different thinking, different risk profiles, and different levels of investment.Walmart's $3bn-plus investment in Jet.com will soon be seen as a bargain."
Based on analysis of more than 1.3m digital shopping receipts, research firm Slice Intelligence found Amazon accounted for 38% of online sales from the beginning of November to 29th December.
That was up slightly from the 37.9% share it took in 2005, but this year's figures confirmed once more the extent to which the company attracts US online shoppers.
Best Buy, which again came second in the rankings compiled by Slice, secured just 3.9% of US online revenues over the same period.
The other major retailers to benefit from US holiday shoppers included Target (2.7%), Walmart (2.6%), Macy's (2.4%), Apple (2.4%), Nordstrom (2.3%), Kohl's (1.6%), Home Depot (1.1%) and J. Crew (0.9%).
Apple, bolstered by its new Apple Watch and MacBook, was the fastest-growing merchant this holiday season with 66% growth over last year, while Lowe's – not included in the top 10 – had the second-highest growth of 58%.
Walmart, Macy's, Nordstrom and J. Crew all witnessed small falls in their share of this holiday season's online shopping revenues, although total online sales across all retailers covered in the report increased by a fifth (20%).
According to Slice, Amazon made significant headway in the final stretch of the holiday season as consumers turned to its Prime Now business to secure reliable deliveries. It said Prime Now accounted for 13% of Amazon's US sales from 16-25 December 2016, compared with 10% in 2015.
"2017 is clearly becoming the year [once again] that Amazon's competitors have no choice but to think differently in order to counter Amazon’s dominance in the e-commerce channel," the report concluded.
"It may finally be evident to all that Amazon is an existential threat that warrants very different thinking, different risk profiles, and different levels of investment.Walmart's $3bn-plus investment in Jet.com will soon be seen as a bargain."
Data sourced from Slice Intelligence; additional content by Warc staff
