Food and Drink E-Commerce in Sweden

PROSPECTS

After a slow start, food and drink e-commerce is seeing dynamic growth

Food and drink e-commerce continued to see double-digit current value growth in 2019. At the beginning of the review period grocery retailers had a low presence in e-commerce, and were slow to respond to the development of pure food and drink e-commerce retailers.

Click-and-collect remains popular

Although home delivery is becoming more widespread, click-and-collect services remain popular in Sweden. Some consumers appreciate the convenience of being able to collect their shopping at a time convenient to them, whilst others are looking to avoid delivery costs.

Home delivery and other services are driving growth in the channel

The end of the review period witnessed an increase in the number of services provided by food and drink e-commerce retailers in Sweden. Whilst offers such as food boxes and individual selections of grocery products had previously been split between pure niche e-commerce retailers, these services are now offered by the major grocery retailers.

COMPETITIVE LANDSCAPE

Modern grocery retailing giants set to take over from niche players

After a slow start, the main grocery retailers now all operate e-commerce channels, and are likely to see strong developments in this area over the forecast period, with ICA, Coop and Axfood all signing agreements with tech firms to improve their online platforms. Over the review period it was largely niche players which led the way in food and drink e-commerce, but these will pale into significance as the grocery retailing giants make headway.

Future of meal kits in question

Carolinas Matkasse remained a strong player in food and drink e-commerce in 2019, with its concept of offering healthy and nutritious meal kits proving popular with consumers in Sweden during the review period. However, sales of its Linas Matkasse meal kits/boxes started to decline at the end of the review period, as consumers favoured buying individual loose items to prepare meals.

ICA and Coop invest in food and drink e-commerce

In 2018, ICA signed an agreement with UK company Ocado to use its e-commerce platform, and is expected to transition to the new platform by 2021. This forms part of the retailer’s planned SEK600 million investment, which it expects will deliver a fully automated e-commerce solution by 2022.

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