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First Quarter E-Commerce Up From Year Ago, But Down From Fourth Quarter
Estimated first quarter U.S. e-commerce sales totaled $11.921 billion, the Census Bureau reported in May.
The amount was a 25.9% increase from last year's first quarter.
Total retail sales were estimated at $772.2 billion, which was up 4.4% from the same time in 2002, the government said.
But estimated first quarter e-sales decreased 13.4% from the fourth quarter and total retail sales for the first quarter decreased 10.7% from the end of last year.
As a total of all sales, e-commerce accounted in the first quarter for 1.5% of all commercial transactions the Census Bureau measures. Last quarter, e-sales were a 1.6% slice of all sales.
The Census Bureau defines e-commerce sales as transactions in which goods and services are ordered by buyers or price and terms of sale are negotiated electronically ' by Internet, electronic data interchange, e-mail or other online system. Payment is not required for the transaction to be included in the estimate.
The data are not adjusted for seasonal holiday and trading-day statistical differences, the government noted.
E-commerce sales estimates come from the sample for the Monthly Retail Trade Survey, which is used to estimate preliminary and final U.S. retail sales. The Census Bureau noted that a 'stratified simple random sampling method' helps select about 11,000 retailers whose sales are then weighted and benchmarked to represent a total national sample of more than 2 million retail firms.
More on Census Bureau retail measurement methodology is available at www.census.gov/mrts/www/mrts.html.
The chart below shows various views of retail and e-tail activity by selected quarters.
| Quarters | Retail Sales | E-commerce Sales | E-commerce percent of total |
| 1st, 2002 2nd, 2002 3rd, 2002 4th, 2002 1st, 2003 | 740,020 818,609 822,215 864,653 772,234 | 9,470 9,761 10,465 13,770 11,921 | 1.3 1.2 1.3 1.6 1.5 |
Source: U.S. Census Bureau
Estimated first quarter U.S. e-commerce sales totaled $11.921 billion, the Census Bureau reported in May.
The amount was a 25.9% increase from last year's first quarter.
Total retail sales were estimated at $772.2 billion, which was up 4.4% from the same time in 2002, the government said.
But estimated first quarter e-sales decreased 13.4% from the fourth quarter and total retail sales for the first quarter decreased 10.7% from the end of last year.
As a total of all sales, e-commerce accounted in the first quarter for 1.5% of all commercial transactions the Census Bureau measures. Last quarter, e-sales were a 1.6% slice of all sales.
The Census Bureau defines e-commerce sales as transactions in which goods and services are ordered by buyers or price and terms of sale are negotiated electronically ' by Internet, electronic data interchange, e-mail or other online system. Payment is not required for the transaction to be included in the estimate.
The data are not adjusted for seasonal holiday and trading-day statistical differences, the government noted.
E-commerce sales estimates come from the sample for the Monthly Retail Trade Survey, which is used to estimate preliminary and final U.S. retail sales. The Census Bureau noted that a 'stratified simple random sampling method' helps select about 11,000 retailers whose sales are then weighted and benchmarked to represent a total national sample of more than 2 million retail firms.
More on Census Bureau retail measurement methodology is available at www.census.gov/mrts/www/mrts.html.
The chart below shows various views of retail and e-tail activity by selected quarters.
| Quarters | Retail Sales | E-commerce Sales | E-commerce percent of total |
| 1st, 2002 2nd, 2002 3rd, 2002 4th, 2002 1st, 2003 | 740,020 818,609 822,215 864,653 772,234 | 9,470 9,761 10,465 13,770 11,921 | 1.3 1.2 1.3 1.6 1.5 |
Source: U.S. Census Bureau
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