For the first time this year, sales of discounted items decreased, down 21.4% during April versus April 2009, while accounting for 18% of total sales last month. What’s more, the average depth of discount was down 2.3 percentage points from the previous April to 25.7%, helping the e-commerce industry achieve a “healthy” month.
These are the findings of the MyBuys E-commerce Wellness Index, a monthly measure based on data from the e-retailer clients of MyBuys Inc., a vendor of product recommendation technology that serves more than 150 web merchants. The study covers MyBuys clients that were active both in April 2010 and April 2009.
The shift to consumers buying full-price items continued in April, as sales of non-promoted items grew 23.6%. Total revenue for April was 2.2% greater than that of the same period last year.
The index seeks to measure the health of e-retailing by aggregating total sales, non-promoted sales, discounted sales performance, depth of discounts and average order value. The overall April result for the MyBuys E-Commerce Wellness Index score—a composite of all the percentage changes—came in at an increase of 20%, up from a 6% increase in March.
“Retailers are continuing to grow and regain a position of stability as their margins improve on the strength of non-discounted sales,” says Robert Cell, MyBuys CEO. “Retailers with personalized merchandising strategies benefit even more as their average order values are $10 greater across the industry on orders with personalization compared to those without. We are excited to see these trends in shopping and purchase behavior continue into the second quarter as month to month improvements turn into sustained growth for Internet retailers.”
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