Good news, bad news on e-com front | July 6, 2006

E-com only one per cent of sales: StatsCan The latest Statistics Canada numbers show online sales experienced another year of double-digit growth, and that’s good. But e-commerce still accounted for only about one per cent of total operating revenues for private firms, and that’s not as good. Combined private- and public-sector online sales for 2005 increased 38.4 per cent, to $39.2 billion. Online sales by private firms increased 37.2 per cent, to $36.3 billion, while those by the public sector increased 55.4 per cent to $2.9 billion. This is the fourth consecutive year of double-digit growth. The increase in online sales was six times the overall rise in Canadian retail sales in 2005. Large firms (more than 100 employees) continue to generate the bulk of online sales, accounting for 62 per cent of the total. Other StatsCan findings: - in 2005, 82 per cent of private-sector firms used the Internet, unchanged from the previous year - about 38 per cent of private-sector companies had a Web site, up from 37 per cent - only 18 per cent of the value of e-commerce sales were reported as exports in 2005, down from a high of 28 per cent in 2002 - four sectors led in the value of online sales: wholesale trade, retail trade, transportation and warehousing, and manufacturing - the proportion of Canadian firms using the Internet in 2005 was unchanged from the previous year - only 18 per cent of respondents felt security concerns held them back from e-commerce The full results are online at www.statcan.ca under the archives for April 20, 2006.

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