Long-term impacts of Corona on the sustainability of online clothing retailing

Research Project, 2020

While many businesses including the clothing industry, are taking hard hits due to Covid 19, online sales are rapidly expanding due to the situation. Many turn to the safe, distant environment of online shopping for the first time. A new group of buyers emerges, a group that might have different preferences when it comes to online shopping and its related home delivery. Existing customers also change their preferences and opt for secure home deliveries rather than crowded collection points. At the same time, companies try to facilitate, and embrace, this new group of buyers and preferences and have to change their operations quickly in order to fulfil the significant higher demand for home deliveries. It is expected that Covid 19 will lead to both short term and long-term changes in the online retail environment. Some of these changes might have a positive and some a negative impact on the environment compared to the situation pre-Corona. This study will explore the impact of Covid 19 on online sales of clothing in Sweden and in particular study any changes in consumer behaviour related to home delivery / collection and returns of packages and how online retailers and parcel delivery companies are responding to this change. It will also seek to estimate the extent to which behavioural changes which are taking place during the Covid 19 crisis will remain in the longer term.