Statistics published showed that approximately £4.2bn was spent online by shoppers in the UK during October 2009, which represents a month on month growth of nearly 8.5% and is better than traditional sales on the UK high street.

It is widely thought that the sales figures would have been even higher had the UK postal strikes not occurred.  However, a lot of UK ecommerce retailers have switched away from the Royal Mail to reduce the impact of any further postal strikes (although no more are currently scheduled).  Ecommerce retailers cannot afford in the current climate to miss out on vital Christmas sales so are ditching the Royal Mail to protect consumer confidence.  Companies such as DHL, City Link and UPS have really benefited from the postal strikes.