Wednesday - September 27, 2000

Online Retail Alive and Well

"Despite the fact that Dot Com retailers have been dropping like flies all year, online retail is alive and well," said Evie Black Dykema, senior analyst at Forrester and author of the Report Online Retail's Ripple Effect. "In fact, online devices' impact on sales is magnifying and rippling through retail -- beyond the Net and into the brick-and-mortar world."

According to Dykema's Report, PCs will retain the spotlight, generating $246 billion in online sales in 2005. ITV will play a supporting role, and mobile devices will make rare cameo appearances. Though these non-PC devices will close only $23 billion in online sales in 2005, they will influence another $128 billion in offline sales.

Forrester has revised its US forecast for 2000 upward by 16% from $38.6 billion to $44.8 billion. This growth is precipitated by a network effect in which new consumers, retailers, product categories, and technologies increase the value of a market. This year, PC-based sales will total $45 billion, and the PC will influence an additional $13 billion. In 2003, PC-based sales will hit $154 billion, and Internet-enabled devices will influence $146 billion in offline sales. In 2005, PCs and Internet-enabled devices will generate $269 billion in sales and influence another $378 billion -- more than half a trillion dollars in overall spending.

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