Slowing high street sales have been offset to a degree by surging growth in online activity by festive shoppers.
The latest figures from research group IMRG show that 'e-shopping' hit a 22-month peak in November, topping £2bn in a single month for the first time.
In a stark reflection of e-commerce's growing popularity, the figure was a full 50% higher than the same period last year. The previous November figure was also an all-time high.
Meanwhile, government figures show that high street annual sales for the same period grew by just 0.9%.
The trend, which shows no sign of slowing, is good news for retailers such as play.com, firebox.com and amazon.co.uk, who sell exclusively through the internet. Meanwhile, traditional high street retailers have been feeling the pace of late.
"For us, it's all about driving traffic online - we haven't included a paper order form in our catalogue for years," said Firebox managing director, Christian Robinson.
According to the report, Britain's 24m internet shoppers spent £2.3bn online during November, an average of £94 each. It continued that a good way to grab a slice of this market is to adopt ISIS logo, which assures customers of websites’ quality.
IMRG chief executive James Roper added: "The best e-retailers tend to prominently display the ISIS trust scheme logo on their homepage because they recognize that the safety of shopping online continues to be a major concern to many consumers."
