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Female fashion trumps menswear in e-commerce sales chart

Wednesday, October 19, 2011 - 11:48 by Sarah Collinson

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More British women are buying their clothes online than their male counterparts, with womenswear leading by 34 per cent, according to a study published by Greenlight.

In July this year, a million searches relating to fashionable products were made in the UK, half of which were specifically aimed at women.

A £4.8 billion market valuation is being put on buying clothes online this year, according to analyst company Mintel. It is likely that female consumers will make up a sizable portion of this spend.

Despite women buying fashion products from the internet in greater numbers than men, it is still male consumers who dominate the wider e-commerce market in terms of overall usage.

Once every two and a half weeks, the average man will buy something via safe shopping online, while for women it is closer to once a month.

Spokesperson, Peter Gold, echoed other industry experts in saying that e-commerce is not directly at odds with the high street and emphasised the idea that, in spite of declining sales at bricks and mortar outlets, the two markets can be complimentary to one another.

ASOS, the online fashion retailer, was recently recognised as one of the most visible and visited sites in the UK, outpacing its competitors when it comes to search ranking and brand reliability, both of which are important to web-savvy consumers.

Both female and male consumers head to ASOS when they want to buy clothes online, although it is closely followed in the rankings by House of Fraser's e-commerce portal and rival online-only retailer, BooHoo.

The pre-Christmas shopping boom is likely to result in even higher levels of online fashion searching in the UK, as consumers look for that perfect item to gift to friends and family.