Technological advances, a fading pandemic and returning confidence within the provide chain stand to make 2022 a banner 12 months for ecommerce. 

Based mostly on progress projections, retail ecommerce gross sales will surpass $1 trillion for the primary time ever in 2022, in line with eMarketer’s US Ecommerce by Class 2022 report. And whereas inflation issues would appear to contradict this, customers spent $2.8 billion in added price from January to March, in line with Adobe Analytics. 

With an expectation that ecommerce progress will return to pre-pandemic ranges this 12 months, realizing what to anticipate and the place to put money into 2022 carries outsized significance.

For BigCommerce’s first trade development report, we study the style class because it emerges from the opposite aspect of two years impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic. Regardless of widespread staffing shortages and provide chain points, the style and attire trade noticed $180.5 billion in ecommerce income in 2021, up from $145 billion in 2020. 

Relative to all different industries in world ecommerce, trend sits middle-of-the-road when it comes to projected progress for 2022. Progress estimates place ecommerce income in 2022 at roughly $205 billion.

Towards this backdrop, the style trade stored tempo with these projections within the first three months of the 12 months.

Learn our full report for extra insights into the state of trend ecommerce to this point in 2022 from BigCommerce and our retailers.

Methodology

BigCommerce’s trend knowledge is sourced straight from our prospects. All knowledge is world and pertains to all international locations the place BigCommerce retailers do enterprise, until in any other case famous.

All comparisons quarter-over-quarter and year-over-year are congruent comparisons between the identical variety of present shops relationship again to the earliest interval used within the comparability. For instance, a comparability between Q1 2021 and Q1 2022 would use knowledge solely from BigCommerce shops that existed in Q1 2021, until in any other case famous. 

For mentions of customer sources in Q1 2022, this knowledge excludes January 2022 and must be regarded directionally. 

For verbatim insights from our prospects, we posed a survey in our buyer management panel consisting of 4 questions on trend trade know-how developments and techniques. 

How the Trend Business Carried out in Q1 2022

We stated 2022 can be a banner 12 months for ecommerce and that goes doubly so for the style trade.

Thus far in Q1 2022, we are able to see a 3% enhance in inclusive GMV for ecommerce as a complete in comparison with Q1 2021. Trend and attire, nevertheless, has grown 19% by the identical measure. 

The identical outperformance of the ecommerce panorama holds true for trend’s common order quantity. Whereas common order quantity (AOV) grew 3% between Q1 2021 and Q1 2022 for all ecommerce industries, trend noticed a 13% enhance in AOV evaluating the identical two intervals. 

Whereas much less pronounced, the development continues to the full variety of orders as effectively. Order totals throughout all BigCommerce have been flat quarter-over-quarter (QoQ), however trend shops noticed a 5% enhance in variety of orders between Q1 2021 and Q1 2022. 

The highest channels for trend continued their dominance.

The primary quarter of this 12 months was big for gross sales via Amazon for BigCommerce trend retailers. In comparison with final 12 months, there was a 321% enhance in inclusive GMV and a 276% enhance in orders.

In the meantime BigCommerce trend retailers promoting via eBay overcame a downward development for GMV and AOV in Q1 of -12% and -14%, respectively. The style and attire class noticed a whole reversal of this development on eBay with a achieve of 29% GMV and 44% AOV in Q1 2022.

We noticed shifts in gross sales by cellular system.

Unusually, regardless of the rising developments in the direction of social commerce, Q1 2022 noticed a decline within the variety of orders positioned with a cellular system in comparison with all ecommerce retail in Q1 2021. There was a decline of 4%. 

Nonetheless, even with this decline in whole orders we noticed a slight enhance in GMV by 2%.

The style trade was counter to this development, with a 13% QoQ enhance in GMV by cellular system and common order worth additionally jumped 14%.  

BigCommerce funded a shopper survey by Profitwell of over 4,000 web shoppers over the age of 18. Of these customers, 80% stated they buy attire and clothes utilizing cellphone apps or internet browsers.

Trend got here out as the highest class for the query out of 15 classes, with the following highest response being 56% for electronics purchases.

North America trend outpaced total North America ecommerce.

Ecommerce progress was modest for North America within the first quarter of the 12 months at 2% GMV QoQ, a lower in orders of 1% QoQ and AOV shifting up 3% QoQ. 

The style trade, nevertheless, blew these numbers away. Trend GMV was up 24% in Q1 2022 versus Q1 2021. Complete variety of orders went up 13% QoQ and AOV was up equally at 13%.

Trend in APAC noticed progress; EMEA main decline.

Total ecommerce retail in APAC noticed main progress QoQ in Q1 2022 with an 19% enhance in GMV and a 17% enhance in orders. Trend didn’t precisely hold tempo with that in APAC and solely noticed a QoQ enhance in GMV of 11% and a 9% enhance in AOV. Complete variety of orders was flat.

Stagnation hit EMEA ecommerce in Q1. There was solely a 3% QoQ enhance in Q1 GMV and eight% QoQ enhance in Q1 AOV. Trend in EMEA seems to have suffered from this total development and contracted significantly. GMV was down 15% QoQ in Q1 and whole orders have been down 27% QoQ. 

Trend and Attire Ecommerce Developments in 2022

It ought to come as no shock that the style and attire trade is thought to be a trendsetter, each on the runway and on-line.

As we glance again on Q1, listed here are some notable ecommerce developments shaping this dynamic class:

Social commerce has change into a precedence.

The evolution has been gradual however obvious to anybody who spends time on social media. The friction in shopping for and promoting via channels like Instagram and TikTok is all however gone. 

In a survey posed to BigCommerce retailers, 48% of respondents cited social media or social commerce because the procuring development or know-how with the best influence to their total enterprise in 2021. 

When posed the identical query, however particular to the style and attire trade, social commerce remained the highest response.

BigCommerce service provider, Crutcher’s Western Put on, added, “Having the ability to supply checkout on Instagram and Fb had the most important influence on our 2021 enterprise.”

We will anticipate this development to develop as extra trend retailers chase it. A later query within the survey requested what new techniques retailers would implement in 2022, with respondents most continuously pointing to social commerce. 

BigCommerce service provider knowledge corroborates this development. For trend retailers promoting via Instagram we noticed a 741% enhance in whole variety of orders evaluating Q1 2022 with Q1 2021.

What’s subsequent for social commerce? Sellers and patrons alike are already benefiting from the rising reside procuring development. If you wish to streamline product discovery and purchases, look no additional than Instagram, Fb and TikTok. 

Closing the sale means providing extra fee choices.

The following commonest response to our survey query concerning the best influence to total enterprise in 2021 — excluding uncategorized responses — was “providing various fee strategies.”

This would come with providing Purchase Now, Pay Later (BNPL) and acceptance of cryptocurrency and digital wallets. 25% of survey respondents stated providing flexibility in funds proved most impactful to their companies.  

Eight % of respondents stated that Purchase On-line, Pickup In-store (BOPIS) was the best consider bettering their companies in 2021. 

The takeaway is evident: Giving potential patrons choices yields optimistic outcomes for ecommerce retail gross sales. 

A related buyer expertise stays key.

We will all agree on the significance of buyer expertise. However simply how impactful is buyer expertise in 2022? 

In our service provider survey, 44% of respondents prioritized enhancing their prospects’ expertise via omnichannel presence, improved customer support and delivery, whereas 20% pointed to omnichannel promoting particularly. 

Our survey surfaced some miscellaneous callouts.

Whereas not as prevalent because the developments highlighted above, some verbatim responses to our survey confirmed curiosity in different areas of ecommerce know-how and techniques.

Curiosity in omnichannel promoting, optimizing the returns course of, search engine optimisation, SMS, checkout optimization and personalization was voiced in open responses to questions on applied sciences making essentially the most influence and methods retailers are planning to boost buyer expertise in 2022.  

Mainstays of the ecommerce advertising and marketing arsenal like electronic mail newsletters and content material advertising and marketing warranted passing mentions within the survey. 

The Way forward for Trend and Attire Ecommerce is Now

The style trade stands to learn most from adopting rising applied sciences. The challenges of matching prospects to the correct product from the consolation of their very own house and providing frictionless checkout experiences at the moment are largely met.  

Some areas which are ripe for getting forward of the curve are consumer expertise (UX), augmented actuality (AR), MetaVerse retail experiences and synthetic intelligence (AI).

Optimize the consumer expertise.

Responsiveness to the best way prospects are interacting with trend retailers is vital to rising and remaining aggressive.

BigCommerce spoke with trend model Natori in regards to the significance of staying the course on the front-end journey in the event you hope to reach on the proper consumer expertise. They cited their collaboration with BigCommerce accomplice Groove Commerce of their success.

Natori’s president, Kenneth Natori, gave his perception on the significance of that front-end expertise.

Arriving right here required placing a stability between kind and performance. Ethan Giffin, founder and CEO of Groove defined, “For a model like Natori, website design and performance carry equal weight. Our objective was to carry their model to life by making a procuring expertise that successfully combines merchandising greatest practices with Natori’s distinctive story. 

“The brand new web site immerses the patron in an aesthetically indulgent expertise whereas nonetheless permitting for pure discovery and sooner looking.”

The flexibleness of headless commerce.

A part of providing a robust consumer expertise is staying agile. Headless commerce, or the decoupling of a retailer’s frontend design from its ecommerce backend, affords a service provider precisely that.

Mark Howes, Vice President of Gross sales for EMEA at BigCommerce explains it this manner.

“Conventional methods have labored effectively for years now, however the tech and the shopper panorama has advanced quickly. Companies must take a brand new method to content material administration. That is the place headless is available in.

“Headless commerce is concentrated on having the ability to evolve your providing at velocity and provides prospects the chance to work together along with your model within the ways in which they select.” 

If there have been any doubt the place a trend model’s priorities must be on the subject of offering a versatile consumer expertise, Howes dispels it:

Increase the procuring expertise.

The augmented actuality market is estimated to succeed in $78 billion by 2028. A big driver of this predicted progress is the adoption of AR by each on-line and brick-and-mortar retailers to enhance upon the procuring expertise. 

Visualizing varied types and colours of a garment or accent with out truly manually swapping them out was the stuff of science fiction, however it should now outline the ecommerce retail expertise for the discerning shopper. 

Equally, having the ability to work together with three-dimensionally rendered high-definition representations of merchandise in real-time will give customers confidence in pulling the set off on purchases of merchandise which are at present nonetheless met with hesitation.

We really feel we must always study craftsmanship and spatial attributes in particular person. Now we can do that from our cellular gadgets and AR headsets.

BigCommerce interviewed augmented actuality product configurator ThreeKit’s VP of Advertising and Alliances, Marc Uible, for the Make It Massive Podcast to listen to an knowledgeable perspective on how and why trend retailers ought to undertake this development. Uribe had this recommendation:

Enter the MetaVerse.

You might have absolutely heard of the MetaVerse — the digital actuality community for real-time social and retail experiences that has dominated know-how information cycles for the final 12 months. Then, you should be conscious that the MetaVerse guarantees to alter our very existence eternally by marrying our insatiable starvation for info with the power to expertise it in a tactile, immersive manner.

What you might not know is that trend manufacturers like Hermes and Gucci have already invested in non-fungible tokens (NFTs) to generate curiosity within the MetaVerse retail future. 

Customers’ curiosity in procuring within the MetaVerse exists already. Referring again to our shopper survey with Profitwell, 46% of these web shoppers responded that they might be keen to buy within the MetaVerse primarily based on their present understanding of the know-how. Considerably encouraging to retailers planning on capitalizing on the MetaVerse, 2% of web shoppers responded that they have already got shopped within the MetaVerse. 

Of curiosity to on-line retailers: These most keen to make purchases within the MetaVerse skewed principally within the Gen Z and Millennial demographics and had a positively correlated curiosity relative to their earnings.  

Resolve buyer ache factors with AI.

BigCommerce has seen this development for a while. There are a variety of ways in which synthetic intelligence can influence ecommerce. The vast majority of them end in optimized and automatic workflows for the service provider and seamless experiences for the shopper.

For instance, on-line retailers searching for methods to curb returns have begun implementing synthetic intelligence options to cease that bleeding from their backside traces.    

For trend retailers concerned about utilizing AI in 2022, our accomplice Bloomreach developed a complete How-To Information. 

Wanting Forward to the Second Half of 2022

If the developments of the primary quarter of 2022 keep fixed or enhance for the style trade, we are able to anticipate that the style class will outpace ecommerce retail total, however see a 12 months that’s in the course of the pack in comparison with all different verticals. 

In a 12 months projected to prime $1 trillion in gross sales, that’s encouraging, if not thrilling. 

BigCommerce Senior Vice President of Product Advertising Meghan Stabler sees a continuation of the know-how developments outlined above.

The ecommerce panorama is consistently evolving and will see but extra developments emerge earlier than the 12 months is out. 

The Ultimate Phrase

Taking inventory of our knowledge and the sentiment of these within the trade, we are able to confidently say that trend and attire retailers are taking effectively to the developments which are sweeping ecommerce retail.

We see the style class outpacing total progress for ecommerce in 2022, with the potential for a record-setting 12 months.

Moreover, the style and attire trade is uniquely positioned to capitalize on rising know-how and shopper developments. 

Social commerce stays a definitive focus for the trade in addition to omnichannel presence. Buyer expertise and fee sort flexibility spherical out the buyer wants of Q1 2022. 

Wanting forward, we see AI, AR and MetaVerse retail experiences looming as the following challenges for retailers seeking to keep forward of the curve.  

Make sure to learn our subsequent 2022 Ecommerce Forecast in Q3 after we’ll check out the sports activities and outdoor class heading into the vacation season.