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IRELAND IS DIGITALLY ‘coming of age’, with the majority of Irish consumers now regularly shopping online, according to the Digital Hub Development Agency.
The agency’s end of year report for 2012 said both enterprises and consumers in Ireland were now ahead of their European counterparts in terms of both purchasing and sales online, with more and more consumers turning to the internet to secure value-for-money purchases.
“The economic recession has been making digital more attractive,” said the agency’s chief executive Philip Flynn. “Conducting transactions online is more cost-effective for consumers and businesses alike.”
Flynn commented that there appeared to be “no recession on the internet”, with a survey of companies based in the Digital Hub showing that 44 per cent had increased staff numbers in 2012, two-thirds planned to do so in 2013, and 78 per cent had increased their client base in 2012.
“Our experience is that companies are finding innovative ways to overcome difficulties within the Irish economy,” Flynn said.
“In some cases, they are pursuing more aggressive marketing and sales strategies. For others, their growth can be attributed to moving into – or expanding their existing operations in – international markets.”
The report said that 2.6 million Irish people regularly shopped online, spending an average of €116 each per month.
The end-0f-year statement could be the last one ever produced by the agency, which is set to be merged into Dublin City Council in the coming year.
Among the projects showcased in its statement is a project that allowed six students from a secondary school in Warrenmount, in the Liberties, to connect to a Higher Level Leaving Cert maths class in a school in Clondalkin.
This allowed the students to take a higher level class where they would not otherwise have had the opportunity, the agency said.
One of its landmark projects for 2013 is a link with St James’s Hospital, aimed at developing what Flynn called “digital solutions to common health challenges”.
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It’d be nice to see more/better Irish on line retailers though. It sickening getting hammered on sterling when buying from Amazon.
Ya but it’s still alot cheaper to buy most things on amazon after the sterling exchange, always pay in gb£s never pay in euro it screws you on the exchange rate you end up paying at least 2% more at least
you could even go to the german page and get some IT or HiFi equip there for ~1/3 of what things cost here.
shame really, i’d like to support local economies, but when the rip off is so obvious at times i’d be mad not to shop around.
Time for people to cop on and realise that competition is no longer based on what shops are in the area.
Sadly Irish retailers still underestimate on-line. Out of date stock inventory, prices, product descriptions and photos…
i nearly always shop online, i can browsw shops, compere prices and check item i want, then check reviews on it.first i always look for irish sites to buy from, but nearly always find this lacking and end up buying from uk sites.
as iv said many times ireland retail and wholesale businesses better wake up ONLINE SHOPPING IS BIG and is also a big market. i could well believe irish consumers spending 2.4 million online, but on irish sites, i wonder!
We are so broke 2.4 million can afford broadband and then spend 140euro a month. Someone telling porkies.
Porkies…. It’s 116 per month not 140. Think your telling the porkies.
Gway you old grinch
Any stats on which types of cards are being used ?
Some Irish retailers are still of the rip-off mentality… In the last few weeks I’ve bought 3 items (which for my job are a must have) On-line… I did try to shop around here, however, Ebay came in with the best deal for the very same equipment..Irish retailers total cost was around €230… From EBay inc shipping and import taxes €110… Massive saving and saved the grief of visiting a shop where you also have to listen to some shop assistant blabber on to her mate about how good her night was and how pissed she got.!!
Setting up online in Ireland is also made difficult by rather messy and expensive banking systems. Getting setup to accept cards online here is really expensive which drives a lot of business abroad.
It’s also extremely expensive to ship from Ireland to other markets due to high postal and courier prices. Again, this makes it hard to setup online here. That’s probably being driven up by things like illogical addresses, no post codes making it difficult for logistics companies to find people etc etc as well as just small market and distance.
We tend to only focus on broadband as a barrier to entry that needs to be addressed. However, there are quite a few other major hurdles for Irish etailers that aren’t being addressed!
It needs a serious government effort to iron out these problems. There’s no reason we shouldn’t be leading Europe in terms of online retail.
I almost always send my purchases to the parcelmotel for collection, thus taking benefit of the free delivery within UK option.
It costs about €3
It would be interesting to know how much was spent on websites outside of ireland against how much Irish companies were making out of Internet shopping. I find I’m supporting more small Irish businesses through Facebook pages etc – it’s a different way of shopping “locally”.
I think the glib quote “there’s no recession on the Internet” is unfair – Internet purchasing is more to do with busy lives and convenient ways to shop and more often than not it’s a way of shopping around for cheaper deals because we have less money to spend so need to be wiser with how we spend it. Unfortunately it does mean that a lot of money ends up outside the country because prices remain high in ireland comparatively.
have your say