E-Commerce Update: IBD Sales Spike

Independent Bookstore Day (IBD) 2021 online sales were up 12.58 percent vs IBD 2020. IBD 2021 also had the highest e-commerce conversion rate (the percentage of online shoppers that complete a transaction) we’ve seen in April 2021.

The above graph shows what this year's IBD sales looked like (blue graph) compared to last year's (orange graph). Although the conversion rate dropped slightly this year compared to last year, the number of users/traffic increased by 34.66 percent (see graph below). Last year, IBD had 94,924 visitors; this year we had 127,827, which is a huge increase. This resulted in more transactions and sales revenue despite the slightly lower e-commerce conversion rate.

It’s interesting to note that for IBD 2021, even though millions of people have now been vaccinated and many more bookstores are open to in-store sales, consumers are still making online purchases at bookstore websites in record numbers.