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B2C E-Commerce in South Africa is projected to account for about a twentieth of total retail sales by 2022.

The COVID-19 health crisis brought changes to the retail market in South Africa with the decline in brick-and-mortar store due to the pandemic-induced lockdowns. The B2C E-Commerce market increased by over 60% between 2019 and 2020. Moreover, online sales are projected to represent about 5% of total retail sales by 2022, which is almost a double growth of share from 2020. Along with this, a nearly 10 p.p. increase in the online shopper penetration was witnessed in the country between 2019 and 2020. Among the top reasons for such an enhanced preference in purchasing items online were convenience, the occurrence of the pandemic and the short waiting period/time efficiency, as of a November 2020 survey. When it came to choosing an online shopping platform in 2020, South African online retailers dominated. Among the most commonly visited were Takealot.com, Gumtree.co.za and others. The leading online retailer in the country witnessed a surge of over 40% y-o-y in its online sales turnover over the first six months of 2020, which happened due to the accelerated online shopping behavior. Moreover, several other retailers seeing the shift in consumer behavior and the opportunities in the E-Commerce market made a decision to adopt digitization. Namely, considerable market players planned to invest in the growth strategy in 2021, as well as, in strengthening their presence in the market. Other than that, one of the giant online global retailers operating in South Africa entered into a partnership with the South African Post Office in order to provide its customers more efficient and convenient delivery service, as of 2021. Although South Africans mostly make online purchases from local online retailers, cross-border online shopping is also well developed in the country. Especially, this shopping pattern is common among the Millennials and Generation X, less among Generation Z. Furthermore, the markets where online shoppers in South Africa purchase from the most frequently were China, the United States and the United Kingdom, as per an October 2020 survey.

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