Men are making more purchases online, reaching parity with women, according to the results of a First Insight report [download page] encompassing two consumer surveys from December 2017 and September 2018.
Between 2017 and 2018 the percentage of purchases made online by men rose from 38% to 41%. This is compared to female shoppers whose estimated online shopping percentage actually dropped from 46% in 2017 to 40% in 2018.
The trend of men shopping more online than women continues when looking specifically at Amazon, which can boast over 80% of market share in several e-commerce categories. Six in 10 men report that the number of purchases they made through Amazon has increased over the past year, while about half of women report the same. Furthermore, more than half of the male respondents said they shopped on Amazon 6 or more times a month, compared to 45% of women reporting shopping on Amazon with that frequency.
Traditional Retailers Also Seeing More Male Than Female Shoppers
Further bucking retail stereotypes, the higher frequency of male shopping is not limited to e-commerce. Men also claim to be shopping at traditional retailers more often than women, with a quarter claiming to shop at least 6 times a month at a department store, compared to just 15% of women. Such gaps in shopping frequency spanned across all types of traditional retail stores.
A case in point is Walmart. As the most frequented store by both men and women, 41% of male survey respondents say they shopped at Walmart six or more times per month compared to 35% of women surveyed.
On the other end of the retail popularity scale, 19% of men reported frequently shopping at luxury stores such as Neiman Marcus, Saks and Gucci versus only 5% of women.
The full report can be viewed here.
About the Data: First Insight’s findings come from two separate surveys. The consumer surveys are based on targeted samples of 1,000 respondents each and were fielded in December of 2017 and September of 2018. They were completed through proprietary sample sources amongst panels who participate in online surveys.
