New research from Forrester concludes that mobile devices (smartphones and tablets) will be used to transact some $114 billion in sales this year in the U.S., with tablets accounting for $76 billion of the total. Today, mobile represents 29 percent of all e-commerce sales and that percentage will grow to 54 percent by 2018.
Mobile will be a major driver in the growth of e-commerce, according to Forrester, which projects that online sales will grow at an annual clip of nearly 10 percent, grabbing 11 percent of all retail sales by 2018, up from eight percent last year.
It's clear from the numbers that even with double-digit annual growth, e-commerce is a long way from conquering retail. In a blog post, Forrester analyst Sucharita Mulpuru lists "the three biggest myths" around the growth in e-commerce sales and its effects on conventional retail stores:
- Retail real estate is dead. Good properties continue to attract tenants and consumers.
- Stores are dying. New concepts are replacing those that are worn out.
- No one goes to malls anymore. Pretty much the same answer as #1.
"The web keeps doing what it has always done well," writes Ms. Mulpuru. "It provides huge assortments of products, at comparable, often lower, prices than physical stores, with 24/7 access and often free shipping."