For the first time in many years, Mercado Libre sales have dropped dramatically.
The brake on consumption is becoming more and more evident and also affects the e-commerce, something that hadn’t happened in previous crises, much less during the pandemic. Over the past month, Mercado Libre sales have declined across most segments, in percentages that exceed 20%. The data comes from Real Trends, an application that analyzes information and traffic in real time on the country’s leading e-commerce platform.
On the main screen you can see it 21 of the 29 main product categories recorded declinesincluding food and beverages, beauty products, mobile phones, appliances, clothing and building materials. There are 7 more that remain stagnant and only one (games and toys) experienced growth. Something logical if we take into account that August 21 was “Children’s Day”.
Real Trends is one of Mercado Libre’s “allied” apps and rivals primarily Nubimetrics. your business is to provide accurate data to companies, importers and sellers to analyze trends and changes in consumer habits. Among other things, it informs who sells the most and at what price. This way you can know from August 14 until yesterday sales of automotive accessories decreased by 21% in units.
Auto parts is the category with the highest number of posts: currently there are 8.2 million. But she is not the only one affected. Clothing and fashion accessories down by 20%; cell phones and telephones, 17% and office equipment, 16%. The data is surprising when you take into account the fact that digital sales have grown year after year, beyond economic contexts.
The deceleration of consumption in general, according to specialists, is substantially produced by three factors. High inflation and falling purchasing power of wages, obstacles to imports and rising cost of credit. So far and due to its low penetration, e-commerce (a business that Mercado Libre conducts) has remained immune.
“Since the pandemic, eCommerce has gone from being marginal to being relevant to merchants. Today, online sales account for 14% of retail sales”, Describes Gustavo Sambucetti, institutional director of CACE, sector chamber.
Until the first half of the year, and with wages in step with inflation, consumption was maintained. According to the CAME (Chamber of Retail Commerce), sales were growing strongly until June, but in July they fell by 3.5% and in August by 2.1%. These figures contrast with the strong increases in January (9.8%) and February (9%). Now neither the Mercado Libre breaks the downward trend.
Andrés Tajer, textile engineer and manager of Casa Pibot, which produces work clothes and school uniforms, assures that in June its sales fell by half and that although there was a recovery in August, it is still 15% lower than in the same month last year. “I have been working with Mercado Libre for 5 years and the platform represents 50% of the company’s total demand,” he said Clarione business man.
Ecommerce scholars agree that Mercado Libre’s records are absolutely new. “In other crises, companies have come out to encourage consumption through offers, promotions and quotas. Today none of the three things are present. What we see is that companies having inventory problems or taking care of inventory (due to import stocks), quotas have become more expensive due to the increase in tariffs and wages are not enough “, they interpret.
Yesterday, the Indec revealed that inflation rose 7% in August. Therefore, so far this year accumulates an increase of 56.4% and 78.5% in one year. Not just that. According to the consultancy Ecolatina, the cost of living has accumulated a 14.4% increase in the past two months, “the highest year-over-year level in the past 30 years.” Even e-commerce cannot resist such a price acceleration.
Damiano Kantor
Source: Clarin
