Everyone of course knows that on-line sales continue to gain share of total US retail spend. But how much?

Well, like everything, it depends on how you measure it.

The US Commerce Dept. tracks all retail sales, including on-line revenues. The ecommerce growth rate every quarter has been averaging about 15% year over years for many consecutive years.

The Commerce Dept. calculates on-line's share of retail to be 9.5% last year, up from about 8.5% in 2014.

But wait, says SCDigest. The denominator - total retail sales - in the government calculation includes all kinds of things, notably sales of cars, restaurants and bars, gas stations and fuel distributors. Take those numbers out, and SCDigest calculates ecommerce's share of relevant retail sales at a much more significant 13.3%, as shown in the graphic below:

With growth of on-line sales averaging around 15%, it means its share will double about every 5 years - so that if it keeps up (and why wouldn't it?), on-line's share will exceed 25% of all retail spend by 2023. And if that proves true, the impact will be dramatic indeed on the retail market - and supply chains.

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