Around 57 per cent in the UAE shop online for children’s clothes up to three times per month compared with 43 per cent shopping in store at least once a month or more, a report said.

Around 42 per cent of parents in the UAE are intimated by designer children’s stores in malls, added the e-commerce survey conducted by Mini Exchange, a leading online shopping site for children’s clothes, including high end, designer childrenswear.

In contrast, many parents purchase designer children’s items such as Dior or Burberry on Mini Exchange’s site on a regular basis, with repeat customers forming the bulk of Mini Exchange’s core business, it said.

Mini Exchange CEO Sarah Appleton said: “Word of mouth and online searches for places to buy children’s clothes have been the main growth drivers for Mini Exchange.”

“I’ve also been delighted to see that our products and service are of such a standard that we get repeat customers and referrals from happy customers.

“This is despite the fact that we face many of the challenges that any e-commerce business in the region must deal with, including the lack of trust in credit card payments, meaning most of our business is Cash on Delivery and of course issues with logistics and delivery of packages,” she added.

Interestingly, 62 per cent of those surveyed stated that the main reason they shop for kids clothes online is convenience, followed by the selection (25 per cent) and benefits such as easy returns (12.5 per cent).  Price was not a factor for shoppers in the UAE and almost half of respondents (43 per cent) said they had purchased branded or designer items for their children at some point.

Mini Exchange also participated in ‘White Friday’, the regional version of the US ‘Black Friday’ on the last weekend of November.  Mini Exchange offered a special discount of Dh60 ($16.33) off all purchases and witnessed record numbers of visitors to the site.

Appleton explained why this last weekend in November is so important for regional shoppers: “Many people in Dubai, families in particular, travel home for the holidays from mid-December, so the last weekend in November is often their last chance to shop for gifts. Offering special ‘White Friday’ discounts is a good way for retailers to remind them of this and to give them an incentive to shop locally rather than waiting until they return to their home countries.”

“I was confident that the e-commerce market here would boom, and this has been confirmed with Mini Exchange experiencing phenomenal growth of 100 per cent month on month,” said Appleton.

“The market is not without challenges, however fortunately we have been able to win our customers’ confidence with the quality of our products, security of our payment gateways and reliability of our delivery.”

Mini Exchange also announced its latest growth figures, showing 100 per cent month on month growth. – TradeArabia News Service