Dutch and Danish biggest online shoppers

Published: 18/02/08

By Nicolien

A research conducted by Eurostat, the Statistical Office of the European Community, shows that more people used the internet to buy online in 2007 than ever before. The percentage of Europeans aged 16 to 74 that ordered goods or services over the internet has increased from 24% in 2005 to 30% in 2007.

The majority of the population between 16-74 in Denmark and the Netherlands has shopped online in 2007 (2006 for Denmark, 2007 numbers not available), 55% of both populations have used the Internet to buy goods. The United Kingdom takes a third place with 53% having e-shopped in 2007.
Bulgaria and Romania are the least experienced with online shopping as only 3% of the population had done so in 2007. This is partly due to a small amount of internet connection in those countries as well as a lack of proper online marketing by the bigger, trusted companies.

A study in 2006 by Eurostat showed that 12% of Europeans in the EU27 had not ordered services or goods online in the preceding 12 months because they were concerned about giving personal or credit card details online. The Spanish(27%), Finish(26%) and Cypriotic(20%) were among the most concerned, whereas a lot of the Eastern European countries seem to have barely any security and privacy concerns with Romania (1%), Bulgaria and Czech Republic (3%) the least concerned.