Introducing the 2023 class of Top 1000 online retailers in North America
For the last year, Digital Commerce 360 tracked the largest 1,000 online retailers in the U.S., Canada, and Mexico, collected data on all facets of their retail businesses, and ranked them based on their 2022 web sales. Our research appears in the newly released 2023 Top 1000 Database.
Below are some key takeaways from our in-depth analysis of their collective financial performance, industry trends from leaders and other telling data points.
Is the ecommerce industry growing?
Overall ecommerce sales in the U.S. from domestic retailers were $1.03 trillion in 2022, up 7.7% year over year. However, the Top 1000 retailers grew their overall ecommerce sales slower at 5.1%, dragged down by top players like Amazon.com Inc., which struggled internationally. That Top 1000 ecommerce growth was a significant slowdown after the pandemic drove 42.6% higher online sales in 2020 and 17.4% in 2021. Still, a long-term look at Top 1000 retailers’ ecommerce growth since the pandemic puts it ahead of where it was in 2019. The compound annual growth rate of ecommerce sales for the three years since the pandemic began was 20.7%, above the 17.8% rate that Top 1000 retailers grew at in 2019.
Retailer demographics
Multichannel vs. online-only retailers
Both web-only and brick-and-mortar retailers are well-represented in the ranks of the Top 1000 online retailers in North America. Although more than four in 10 — 42.8% — are web-based merchants, more than two in 10 — 20.8% — are store-based chains. Nearly a third — 32.8% — of the Top 1000 are consumer brand manufacturers, while just a few dozen are direct marketers.
Top industries for ecommerce
Apparel and accessories merchants are the best-represented industry among Top 1000 retailers, with 247 making the ranks this year. The category collectively grew ecommerce sales 6.5% year over year. Housewares and home furnishings retailers are the second-most populous category, with 115 in the Top 1000. However, the set’s large number and 6.0% year-over-year decline in web sales helped draw down the Top 1000’s overall web sales growth in 2022.
Measuring growth
Ecommerce growth by merchant type
Specifically looking at the Top 1000 retailers in North America, consumer brand manufacturers grew web sales 8.3% in 2022 compared to the year before. Web-only retailers grew 4.0% and retail chains grew 5.7%.
Fastest growing online industries
Though not the top-performing industries for ecommerce, online health and beauty sales, hardware sales, and automotive sales grew the most year over year in 2022 compared to 2021. Health and beauty increased 9.8%, hardware and home improvement increased 9.8% and automotive parts and accessories grew 9.7%.
Retailer snapshots
Leading e-retailers in North America
Digital Commerce 360 ranks the Top 1000 online retailers in North America every year. In 2022, these were the top 10 online retailers:
| Rank | Retailer | 2022 Web Sales | Growth |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Amazon | $357.21 | 17.9% |
| 2 | Walmart | $73.20 | 12.8% |
| 3 | Apple | $72.43 | 14.1% |
| 4 | Home Depot | $20.71 | 8.9% |
| 5 | Target | $19.77 | 19.5 |
| 6 | Best Buy | $16.43 | -12.0% |
| 7 | Wayfair | $13.71 | -3.1% |
| 8 | Kroger | $13.49 | -3.2% |
| 9 | Costco | $13.44 | 37.3% |
| 10 | Nike | $10.83 | 19.0% |
Fastest-growing online retailers
Though not the top-performing online retailers, retailers like Thredup Inc. and Oddity are worth mentioning for their web sales growth rate in 2022.
| Top 1000 Rank | Retailer | Growth % |
|---|---|---|
| 230 | 1847 Goedeker | 557.2% |
| 856 | Olivela | 430.0% |
| 746 | Conn’s | 171.3% |
| 528 | The RealReal | 129.6% |
| 36 | Peloton | 115.4% |
| 60 | Tapestry | 104.2% |
| 833 | Floyd | 98.0% |
| 273 | Oddity | 95.6% |
| 312 | Steve Madden | 89.0% |
| 307 | Hims & Hers | 84.2% |
The Amazon Angle
Amazon sales for 2022
Amazon maintains an outsized influence on the direction of the Top 1000, accounting for more than a third of ecommerce sales for the group. However, this year, it grew slower than the Top 1000 overall, with a 4.4% increase in web sales for the year.
Ecommerce trends 2022
The 2023 Top 1000 Database provides nearly 200 key financial, performance and corporate metrics on North America’s largest 1,000 online retailers, including:
- Rankings by 2022 web sales and five years’ worth of web and total sales.
- Key performance metrics, including growth, average ticket, conversion rate and website traffic.
- Full operations, including omnichannel services, marketplaces sold on, website features and functions, customer service, payment options and international shipping.
- Additional financial data, including share of sales from mobile devices and cross-border sales by region.
- Company information, including merchant type, primary merchandise category, corporate address, year launched and vendor details.
- Email marketing and shopper demographics.
What’s New in 2023?
- Subcategories are here! We have added over 90 new subcategories to the filters within our 15 main categories
- 7 new metrics under Retailer Summary
- 4 new metrics under operations for web performance
- 4 new shipping metrics
- 3 new payment types
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