John Lewis boasts impressive online sales performance

Friday, January 3, 2014 - 21:35 by Graham Miller

The festive period was a great one for safe shopping online, with consumers getting great prices in a secure environment and retailers managing to make up for sluggish high street sales.

While some major companies, including Debenhams, revealed that they had not enjoyed a particularly promising Christmas, others are looking a little stronger. John Lewis revealed that its e-commerce sales were up by almost a quarter, year on year, making it one of the winners in the multiplatform marketplace, according to the Financial Times.

On the high street, the department store chain saw a sales boost of just 1.2 per cent, so it is largely relying on shopping online to keep it ahead of its rivals.

The nature of John Lewis' business may also be allowing it to thrive online and get by on the high street to a greater degree than its contemporaries which are struggling. Having lots of departments and products on offer in the same place makes it more likely that consumers will spend a significant amount of cash in a single transaction, rather than heading elsewhere, which is what helps the likes of Amazon succeed as well.

Company spokesperson, Andy Street, said he did not believe there was a likelihood that the e-commerce growth that John Lewis was experiencing would result in a decrease in sales at its bricks and mortar outlets. He explained that the loyalty of customers was more important than the place that sales were being secured, which is the kind of outlook that will likely be common across the retail sector.

People who shop with John Lewis, both on the high street and online, spend four times as much than those who engage via one platform or the other, according to Mr Street. This outlines the true value of making both sides of the experience as positive as possible.