Europe’s Top 10 online retailers

The top 10 merchants in Internet Retailer’s Europe Top 300 account for 23.2% of all online retail sales on the continent, but it’s Amazon that dominates. In 2010, Amazon accounted for 16.3% — 9.36 billion euros — of the online sales of all Europe Top 300 retailers.

The top 10 web merchants in Internet Retailer’s newly published Europe Top 300 research guide remain a domineering group, accounting for 23.2% — 27.4 billion euros — of total estimated 2010 European business-to-consumer e-commerce sales of 118.3 billion euros.

Amazon dominates
But there’s one merchant that dominates all of the rest: Amazon.com. With Internet Retailer-estimated sales in Europe of 9.36 billion euros last year, up 39.7% from Internet Retailer-estimated sales of 6.70 billion euros in 2009, Amazon accounted for 34.1% of all Top 10 Europe 300 sales.

Amazon, which began selling books online in Great Britain in 1997, enjoys significant market share in the European online retailing business because the e-retailer has built up a significant European infrastructure that includes nine fulfillment centers in the United Kingdom, France, Germany and Iceland, a customer service center in Germany and a research and development center in Great Britain. Furthermore the company has built up market share by making key acquisitions and investing in fast-growth companies.

Top 10
Amazon is followed in the top 10 rankings in the Europe Top 300 by Otto Group with 2010 web sales of 3.83 billion euros; Tesco Stores, 3.15 billion euros; Staples Inc., 2.83 billion euros; PPR SA, 2.3 billion euros; Home Retail Group, 1.41 billion euros; 3 Suisses, 1.18 billion euros; CDDiscount.com, 1.18 billion euros; Neckermann Gruppe; 1.10 billion euros; and Dixons Stores 1.09 billion euros.
The numbers for Tesco, Staples, Home Retail Group, 3 Suisses, CDDiscount.com, Neckermann and Dixons are Internet Retailer estimates.

The 10 biggest online merchants in the Europe Top 300 also remain a diversified group and represent several individual European e-commerce markets. Otto, which owns all or a portion of more than 100 e-commerce brands, and Neckermann, a direct marketer of mass merchandise, are based in Germany. Tesco, which serves more than 1 million online customers, Home Retail, a home furnishings and general merchandise chain retailer, and Dixons, a computer and consumer electronics chain retailer, are based in the U.K. PPR, the parent company of Redcats, 3 Suisses, a direct marketer of apparel and accessories, and CDDiscount.com, a mass merchandise online retailer, are based in France. In addition to Amazon, the U.S. is represented in the top 10 among the Europe Top 300 retailers by office supplies chain Staples.

Source: Internetretailer