France and Germany See Highest Gains Yet in Pre-Christmas Cyber Shopping, According to Comscore Networks

France Shopping Activity has Grown More than the U.K. or Germany thus Far

London, U.K., 18 December, 2006 – Comscore Networks, a leader in measuring the digital age, today released an update on European online holiday shopping activity in the U.K., France and Germany. Comscore’s analysis revealed that the week ending 10 December was the most active cyber shopping week to date in both France and Germany, with visits to secure Web pages up 90 and 76 percent, respectively, versus the pre-holiday shopping period from 28 August – 29 October. During this week, the U.K. saw a 69-percent increase versus the pre-holiday shopping period, which was consistent with the previous week’s increase, also the largest increase to-date over the pre-holiday shopping period.

“With only two weeks left until Christmas, shoppers are grabbing their lists and flocking to online retailers,” said Bob Ivins managing director of Comscore Europe. “Cyber traffic levels are approaching twice their pre-holiday levels at online retailers – especially in France, which reached a new peak this week.”

TABLE 1

*Defined as the change in number of visits to secure sections of retail sites compared to the pre-holiday base period, which is the average of weekly visits to secure sections of online retail sites from 28 August - 29 October. An index of 165 should be read as, “65 percent more visits to secure sections of retail sites took place, compared to the average (100) during the pre-holiday period.

French Holiday Review

The week ending 10 December represented the most active online shopping week thus far in France, which had 90 percent more shopping activity versus the pre-holiday shopping period – more than that of the U.K. or Germany to date. In keeping with the previous two weeks’ trend, Groupe PPR, CDISCOUNT.com, and Amazon Sites captured nearly half of all cyber shopping activity during the week ending 10 December. During this week, Groupe PPR captured 28 percent of cyber shopping visits in France while CDISCOUNT.com captured 12 percent and Amazon Sites captured 8 percent.

TABLE 2

*Percentage of total weekly shopping visits to secure sections of retail sites
** Excludes traffic from public computers such as Internet cafes or access from mobile phones or PDAs
***Not including eBay

U.K. Holiday Review

Online shopping activity in the U.K. during the week ending 10 December remained consistent with the prior week – up 69 percent versus the pre-holiday shopping period. Amazon Sites and Argos each received 12 percent of all shopping visits, together capturing nearly a quarter of all cyber shopping activity in the U.K. Following these two sites were Tesco Stores, Play.com Sites and Littlewoods Shop Direct Group, which each received 6 percent of all U.K. cyber shopping visits during the week.

TABLE 3

*Percentage of total weekly shopping visit to secure sections of retail sites
** Excludes traffic from public computers such as Internet cafes or access from mobile phones or PDAs
***Not including eBay

Germany Holiday Review

The week ending 10 December represented the most active online shopping week thus far in Germany. Amazon Sites, Otto Gruppe and Neckermann.de continued to lead the German shopping category, with 15, 9, and 8 percent of total German cyber shopping visits, respectively. While O2Online.de captured a smaller share of shopping visits than Neckermann.de, it still gained share over last week, garnering 7 percent of all German cyber shopping visits along with Quelle.de.

TABLE 4

*Percentage of total weekly shopping visits to secure sections of retail sites
** Excludes traffic from public computers such as Internet cafes or access from mobile phones or PDAs
***Not including eBay

About Comscore World Metrix

Comscore World Metrix is the first service to continuously measure and report online behaviour on a world-wide basis, providing visitation metrics and demographic characteristics for Web site audiences around the world. With active representation of countries that comprise the vast majority of the global Internet population, World Metrix provides its clients with worldwide Internet population estimates and harmonized online performance metrics based on a consistent methodology across all countries. More than 100 clients subscribe to Comscore’s World Metrix service, including 8 of the top 10 interactive advertising agencies.

About Comscore Networks
Comscore Networks is a global leader in measuring the digital age. This capability is based on a massive, global cross-section of more than 2 million consumers who have given Comscore permission to confidentially capture their browsing and transaction behaviour, including online and offline purchasing. Comscore panellists also participate in survey research that captures and integrates their attitudes and intentions. Through its proprietary technology, Comscore measures what matters across a broad spectrum of behaviour and attitudes. Comscore consultants apply this deep knowledge of customers and competitors to help clients design powerful marketing strategies and tactics that deliver superior ROI. Comscore services are used by global leaders such as AOL, Microsoft, Yahoo!, Verizon, Best Buy, The Newspaper Association of America, Tribune Interactive, ESPN, Fox Sports, Nestlé, MBNA, Universal McCann, the United States Postal Service, Merck and Expedia. For more information, please visit www.comscore.com.

Press
Bill Daddi
Daddi Brand Communications
646-370-1341
press@comscore.com