A study ordered by ANC in view of assessing the Romanian electronic commerce market, conducted during September – October 2008, revealed that the number of Romanian online stores would keep growing by 50% per year during 2009 – 2011, reaching 3,000 active stores that carry commerce activities on the Internet.

“We may estimate that the electronic commerce market is now registering a EUR 250 million value, and the representatives of the online stores, quoted in the abovementioned study, appreciate that in the following two years the volume of the online sales shall reach one billion euro, excluding services, namely tourism and bills payment”, Liviu NISTORAN, the ANC President, declared.

According to the study on electronic commerce, currently, in Romania, there are approximately 900 active online stores, most of them offering communications and technology products for sale. Computer games, toys, flowers, watches and tickets to various shows are sold by 30% of the Romanian online stores. Books and information are sold by only 10%, and other 10% of all stores deal with clothing and fashion. At present, nearly 5% of all Romanian sites are intended for e-commerce activities.

In 2007, there were launched stores that sell laptops, stationery products, networking, software, toys, auto products, shoes, audio, video or music products. In 2008, one may notice a growing trend as regards the number of stores specialised in selling products such as computers, telephones, films, art, industrial products, auto products and clothing. The study appreciates that during 2008 – 2009 the information technology products shall dominate the online shop windows.

“The fact that most of those who bought products on the Internet said they used the Romanian online stores (only 3% claim they exclusively bought from the online stores from abroad) means that the Romanian Internet users, who purchase online, trust the national e-commerce sites”, appreciated Liviu Nistoran, while quoting the study.

 Furthermore, the study shows that 72% of those who purchased products online in the past 12 months accrued to buy new products, which means that they were satisfied and they became loyal clients of the respective stores.

Most of the online buyers responded that they purchased IT&C products. 26% of the respondents declared that they had spent more than RON 2,000 in the Romanian IT&C online stores during the last year. The persons that stated they were not online buyers have a RON 1,072 monthly average income, whereas the online buyers have a RON 1,945 monthly average income.

ANC intends to support the electronic commerce industry in order to develop a trust mark – a system based on a behaviour code, accepted by the online stores, whose compliance to be certified by an independent body. This system was adopted in many EU Member States. ANC analyses the possibility to elaborate, alongside the industry and the online buyers, an alternative system for the dispute settlement between the online buyers and the online stores. Such system would enhance the buyers’ confidence in the electronic commerce, thus offering them a simpler and quicker manner of settling the disputes.

The study ordered by ANC was undertaken by Link 2 eCommerce, cost approximately EUR 6,000 and had 6,095 respondents among online users and 51 among online stores.