e-Marketer predicts it will take up to five years for offline sales to return to pre-pandemic levels. The drop in retail sales will exceed that of the Great Recession. In the latest forecast on US retail sales (which includes auto and fuel), total retail sales will drop by 10.5% this year, steeper than the 8.2% decrease in 2009. But e-commerce sales will jump 18% in 2020, up from the prior forecast of 13%. Yet American’s reliance on Amazon and other online retailers for necessities is not going to be enough to offset losses from offline retail.

“This is the sharpest consumer spending freeze in decades in the U.S.,” said eMarketer Senior Forecasting Analyst Cindy Li in a report. “In just a couple weeks, as Americans sheltered in place, retail sales fell dramatically in March. With sales hitting their lowest point of the year in Q2, it will take years before consumer activity returns to normal levels,” she predicted.

• E-commerce sales will jump 18.0% this year.
• Brick-and-mortar retail sales will fall by 14% to $4.184 trillion.
• In 2020, total retail sales will drop 10.5% to $4.894 trillion, a level not seen since 2016.
• Total food and beverage sales will jump 12.5% this year to reach $1.110 trillion, while health and beauty sales will grow 6.9% to $556.30 billion. Every other category will see a drop in sales.
• Walmart will see its e-commerce sales jump by more than 35% in 2020, growing to claim a 5.8% share of the US e-commerce market.
• Amazon will increase its e-commerce market share to 38%.

“Everything we’re seeing with e-commerce is unprecedented, with growth rates expected to surpass anything we’ve seen since the Great Recession,” said eMarketer Principal Analyst at Insider Intelligence Andrew Lipsman. “Certain e-commerce behaviors like online grocery shopping and click-and-collect have permanently catapulted three or four years into the future in just three or four months.”