Retailers embrace online shopping

As Australian retailers wake up to a growing demand from customers for Internet-based shopping, some of the major players are vying to become the biggest and best online shopping mall, reports ComputerWorld.

Online shopping is a $30 billion industry in Australia and is expected to grow to $36 billion by 2013, according to industry estimates.

Traditional and Internet retailers gathered in Sydney on Wednesday to take lessons on the future of retailing from the pack leaders.

Big Pond News reports that, Internet giant eBay says it is aiming for its Web site to be the place where customers browse online - the same way shoppers do in a physical shopping mall.

“Think of us as an online shopping mall,” eBay VP Deborah Sharkey told AAP. “In the offline world Myer partners with Westfield, in the online world - with six million Australians visiting eBay every month - we're aggregating shoppers,” she says. “We're investing in traffic so that our supply partners don't have to.”