Once the kitchen cupboards were packed, the French confined to their homes decided to rush on to other products. Obviously with two objectives: work or study from a distance and have fun.
At the top of online shopping, IT equipment: computers, tablets and printers. "Customers have prepared for telework and school at home," says Olivier Garcia, product manager at Fnac Darty. Sometimes it is necessary to have multiple computers. If the entire Fnac.com site has seen its sales increase by 350% in recent days, the multimedia category alone explodes, with volumes multiplied by 4 compared to March 2019. Same rush for computers at Cdiscount. "The IT category has been multiplied by two compared to the usual averages and printer sales have been multiplied by 7", notes the Bordeaux e-commerce platform.
Guillaume, father of three children aged 12, 14 and 16, himself ordered a laptop computer on Amazon.fr on Monday evening. “The children broke the family computer by dropping it, testifies this Parisian, currently in telework. I needed one right away because we only have the iPad and our cellphones to work. But I won't be delivered until Thursday, which is an unusual delay for Amazon Prime. "
Does increased demand for IT drive up prices? "In customer comments, I understand that this HP model at 499 euros had been a little cheaper in the past," says Guillaume. But overall, the increases still seem contained. "The price variations are very slight for the moment: between -3% and + 3%", analyzes Romain Gavache, the boss of the online product comparator leDénicheur.fr.
Second category of products to break sales records: consoles and video games. "One month that my Play Station is on leboncoin, nobody wants it and there I get lots of messages," a certain Bidiboy on Twitter wonders. It's dead, I keep it! "
Consoles and video games are a hit
“On the“ gaming ”part (video games, consoles, board games), the volumes have increased tenfold, observes Olivier Garcia of Fnac Darty. We are going to beat the pre-order record (which was previously held by the Zelda game) with the Animal Crossing game which will be released this weekend. "On leDénicheur.fr, Romain Gavache has also recorded two to three times more clicks since the beginning of March on PS4 and Nintendo Switch consoles, the two star consoles in the segment" whereas audio, video and smartphone are rather on the decline ".
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In Cdiscount's current sales, games and toys rank in the top 2, behind IT and before pet products, whose sales have increased threefold compared to usual. On Amazon, the eight jars of Playdo play dough registered an extraordinary increase in demand of 19,140% over the last 24 hours. Batteries and felts are among the best sellers of the moment. At Fnac, sales of supplies and extracurricular products increased tenfold.
Trampolines, barbecues and fitness articles
Another category to do well in this period of confinement: "gardening and DIY work very well," says Cdiscount. The French have obviously decided to take advantage of these forced weeks at home to start work and maintain the garden. Thanks to the good weather, we also observe an unusual increase in this month of sales… of trampolines and barbecues. From 3 to 4 orders per day last week, the specialized site Barbecue & Co has increased to around 10 orders per day since Monday. “For us, it's the start of the season. We hope that the website will take over from the store to limit the damage… ”, says Antoine Ambroise, part-time manager of the huge Feucherolles store (Yvelines) which had to close on Monday. Another specialist in the garden and outdoor games confirms that his trampolines are courted. But, after having put part of its employees on partial unemployment and thanking its temporary workers, the company is currently fighting with its suppliers to cancel certain orders which will not find takers with the closure of the stores…
At the northern sports giant Decathlon, the website has also taken over from the shops, all closed. Logically, “fitness products (Editor's note: linked to home sports) are highly acclaimed, notes Décathlon: elastics for muscle building, floor mats, suspension straps, dumbbells, skipping ropes but also exercise bikes. "
Note that on Fnac-Darty, until the beginning of the week, freezers were among the best sellers with sales multiplied by ten.