According to the latest census, Romanians number just over 19.7 million. Of these, about 10 million also have internet access. And they use it extensively. To read news, to stay on social networks, to check email, or to shop online.
Romanians' appetite for online shopping is increasing, as expected, year by year. Both the number of orders and the total value of orders are growing.
On average, Romanians pay more for purchases made from foreign stores, somewhere around 67 euros, while in our country, the average amount is about 47 euros. However, those at GPeC, the authors of this study, calculated an average value of only 35 euros for online payments.
One of the reasons may be the speed we enjoy here - 55.54 Mbps, noticeably higher than in Sweden (ranked second after us, with 47.08 Mbps) and the Netherlands (third place, 45.71 Mbps).
The majority of online shoppers are young people, aged between 25 and 35. Their favorite day is Wednesday, and foreign online stores seem to be very attractive to them.
According to data provided by organizations that oversee online retail, at the end of 2014, the existence of about 5,000 online stores was estimated, among which only 1,173 (source: RomCard) are registered in the 3D Secure system, compared to approx. 1,000 in 2013.
Although the e-commerce market grew significantly in 2014 compared to 2013 (from approx. 600 million euros to almost 1.2 billion euros), this segment accounts for only 2.2 – 2.5% of the total.
What do Romanians spend their money on?
Not surprisingly, IT&C products top this ranking, from computers and keyboards to mobile phones and tablets.
In second place are clothing and footwear items, grouped under the same umbrella, Fashion. The largest and most important player in this sector is FashionDays.ro, which estimates that last year Romanians spent about 140 million euros just in this segment.
The third place is occupied by a newcomer, namely the Home & Deco sector, which has only been present on the market for about 2 years.
Regardless of the products purchased, Romanians are still traditional in terms of payment methods, with 90% preferring to pay cash on delivery (upon receipt of the package).
Adding it all up, in 2014 the total number of card transactions was 9,456,668, of which 7,534,668 were recorded in the RomCard system and 1,922,000 through Netopia mobilPay. The total amount paid by card reached 337 million euros.
More details can be found in the adjacent infographic, also provided by GPeC.
