Number of Online Stores Declines While Online Revenue Grows

The Dutch ecommerce market shows a striking contrast in 2026. The number of online retail businesses is declining, while consumers are actually spending more online. On April 15, 2026, the Netherlands had 101,905 businesses in the retail-via-internet category. That was 1,515 fewer than at the beginning of the year, a decline of approximately 1.5 percent.

This decline does not mean that ecommerce is losing ground. In June 2026, online revenue in Dutch retail was 7.5 percent higher than a year earlier. Multichannel retailers increased their online revenue by nearly 10 percent, while online stores with ecommerce as their primary business activity generated almost 6 percent more revenue. The market is therefore still growing, but the gains are not automatically distributed across all providers.

The combination of fewer online stores and higher online revenue points to a professionalization of the market. Consumers continue to shop online, but increasingly choose providers that combine trust, convenience, good product information and reliable service. Online stores without clear positioning or sound business operations are therefore finding it more difficult. Simply having an online presence is no longer enough to achieve structural growth.

Fewer Online Stores Do Not Mean Less E-commerce

The number of businesses and total market revenue measure two different developments. A market can generate more revenue with fewer providers when existing players grow, weaker businesses exit and consumers concentrate their purchases among a smaller number of reliable online stores. The decline in the number of businesses therefore primarily says something about the composition of the market. It says far less about consumers’ willingness to shop online.

The technical barrier to entering ecommerce has steadily decreased for years. With a standard platform, a payment provider, a product feed and an advertising account, an online store can be launched relatively quickly. However, that does not automatically create a differentiated offering, profitable customer acquisition or reliable operations. The commercial and organizational barrier has therefore remained much higher than the technical barrier.

The ecommerce market is not shrinking because consumers are abandoning online shopping. It is becoming more selective as professionally managed businesses capture a larger share of the growth.

That difference becomes visible once the initial growth phase is over. An online store can function technically while still lacking sufficient differentiation, profitability or scalability. When acquisition costs rise, customers have higher expectations and suppliers allow less room for error, weaknesses in the business model become increasingly difficult to compensate for. Market growth no longer automatically masks those weaknesses.

Online Revenue Growth Does Not Automatically Reach Every Online Store

Online revenue growth of 7.5 percent in June is positive for the market as a whole, but it offers no guarantee for individual businesses. Growth can be highly concentrated among larger retailers, marketplaces, strong niche brands and multichannel organizations. An online store can therefore lose market share even while the overall online market expands. Businesses that look only at the general growth figure may assess their own development too positively.

An online store should therefore compare its performance using more than revenue for the same month a year earlier. The number of orders, average order value, gross margin, return rate, customer acquisition costs and repeat purchases are also important. Revenue growth that is entirely purchased through higher advertising budgets or deeper discounts does not represent healthy growth. The same applies to growth that creates a disproportionate amount of manual processing and customer service work.

The most important question is not whether the market is growing, but which part of that growth is economically attractive and operationally manageable. Some product categories can generate substantial revenue while contributing very little. Other categories may grow more slowly but create a stronger foundation through better margins and more repeat purchases. Professional ecommerce therefore requires decisions based on contribution rather than volume alone.

Multichannel Retailers Benefit From Trust and Reach

It is notable that multichannel retailers achieved stronger online growth in June than businesses with online sales as their primary activity. They often combine physical visibility, existing customer relationships, brand awareness and logistics capabilities with the convenience of ordering online. A consumer can research a product online, view it in a store and later order from the same company. This combination reduces uncertainty and increases trust.

Many multichannel organizations also already have a customer base, physical locations, employees and return options. As a result, they do not have to build every part of the customer relationship exclusively through paid online channels. Their physical presence can function as a marketing channel, while the online store adds additional reach and ordering convenience. This partly explains why online growth does not flow exclusively to pure-play ecommerce businesses.

Pure online players still have clear advantages. They can test more quickly, choose a sharper niche, serve international markets and automate processes extensively without having to account for a large physical store network. Those advantages only produce results when the online store is managed as a single commercial system. A loose collection of products, campaigns and technical integrations does not yet constitute a scalable ecommerce business.

The Pandemic Boom Left Behind an Overcrowded Market

During and around the COVID-19 period, the number of online stores increased exceptionally quickly. Consumers were forced to buy more online, while entrepreneurs saw opportunities to launch ecommerce businesses with relatively limited investment. Existing retailers accelerated their digital sales, while new providers responded to temporary demand and rapidly changing purchasing behavior. This development accelerated the structural shift toward online shopping.

However, not every new online store was built for a mature and competitive market. Some businesses relied heavily on temporary product trends, inexpensive advertising or a limited assortment without recognizable positioning. Other online stores were launched alongside a job or an existing business but never received enough time and attention to be managed professionally. Once the exceptional market conditions disappeared, the distinction between an experiment and a sustainable business became clearer.

The current decline can therefore partly be viewed as a normalization after years of rapid expansion. This does not mean that small online stores have no future. It does mean that a general offering without a clear target audience, operational advantage or distinctive expertise provides increasingly little protection. The market does not necessarily require larger businesses, but it does require better-organized businesses.

Professionalization Determines Who Benefits From Growth

Professionalization does not begin with adding more software, advertising or sales channels. It begins by explicitly connecting customer needs, assortment, margin, marketing, technology and operations. An online store becomes stronger when every layer contributes to the same commercial objective. Deviations must also become visible early, so that problems are not discovered only after revenue has been lost or customer complaints have arisen.

The comparison below shows why the same market development creates an opportunity for one online store while placing additional pressure on another.

The difference is not determined solely by size or budget. A small niche online store can be managed more professionally than a larger retailer with fragmented processes and unclear responsibilities. Professionalization mainly means that a business can identify more quickly where value is created, where margin disappears and which activities need to be improved or stopped. This allows it to invest more selectively without paying for growth through additional complexity.

A Focused Niche Is Becoming More Important Than Assortment Breadth

When online supply was still more limited, a broad assortment could be an advantage in itself. In a mature market, more choice does not automatically create more relevance. A large assortment actually increases the requirements for product data, category management, filters, content, inventory information, pricing logic and customer service. Without a clear structure, additional products become more of a management burden than a commercial advantage.

A niche online store can respond more effectively to specific purchasing needs. The business understands which product features matter, which comparisons customers make and which uncertainties need to be resolved before purchase. That knowledge can be translated into product selection, advisory content, product bundles, filters and targeted campaigns. This creates a reason for customers not to buy directly from a marketplace or general retailer.

Niche positioning does not automatically protect a business from competition, but it does make clearer where the online store intends to win. That may be expertise, availability, service, product combinations, international access or a more efficient supplier chain. Without such a choice, the online store remains dependent on traffic that can just as easily move to a comparable provider. Competition then takes place primarily on price and advertising budgets.

Product Data and Discoverability Are Becoming Strategic Business Assets

Many online stores still treat product data as information that only needs to be entered once. In reality, the quality of that data determines how products are found, compared, advertised and purchased. Incomplete attributes limit filters and organic visibility. Outdated prices or inventory levels result in wasted advertising spend, canceled orders and disappointed customers.

This becomes even more important when an online store combines assortments from multiple suppliers or sells internationally. Names, categories, sizes, colors and technical specifications must then be translated and normalized consistently. One supplier may provide the same attribute differently from another supplier. Without a data model, the result is a catalog in which comparable products cannot be compared properly.

High-quality product data also supports affiliate marketing, shopping feeds and marketplaces. External channels can only deliver relevant visitors when titles, attributes, prices and availability are reliable. Product data is therefore not only an operational task, but also a marketing requirement. An online store with better data can sell the same assortment more effectively than a competitor that simply spends more on media.

Automation Should Protect Margin and Reliability

Automation is often presented as a way to process more orders with fewer people. That is only part of its value. Its most important contribution arises when automation prevents errors, makes current information available and allows commercial decisions to be implemented more quickly. Properly designed automation therefore protects not only capacity, but also margins and customer trust.

A professional online store therefore does not automate only marketing messages. Product data, inventory, price updates, order processing, tracking, return information and reporting must also be logically connected. Especially with large assortments, multiple suppliers or dropshipping, even a small data discrepancy can immediately result in incorrect prices, unavailable products or delayed deliveries. Manual checks only solve that problem temporarily.

The most valuable automation can be recognized by four characteristics:

• Product, price and inventory data are managed from a clearly defined source.
• Orders and status updates move through the chain without unnecessary manual handoffs.
• Exceptions become visible before they create structural customer problems.
• Reporting shows revenue, margin, return pressure and operational costs in context.

Automation does not automatically make a weak business model profitable. It mainly amplifies the behavior already present in the system. A well-designed process becomes faster and more reliable, while an incorrect pricing rule or poor data flow can cause damage on a larger scale. Automation should therefore always follow clear commercial and operational decisions.

Revenue and ROAS Do Not Tell the Full Story

The CBS figures show that online spending is growing, but they do not reveal how much profit individual online stores retain. For entrepreneurs, that distinction is crucial. Higher revenue can coincide with higher advertising costs, lower gross margins, more returns, additional support and more expensive fulfillment. A business that looks only at revenue can therefore reward growth that is actually weakening the company financially.

ROAS also provides only a partial picture. The ratio between advertising revenue and media costs does not account for purchasing costs, shipping, payment providers, platform commissions, discounts, returns and operational processing. A campaign may appear successful at the advertising level while contributing very little to the bottom line. That risk is particularly high with low margins, high return rates and products that generate many customer service inquiries.

A more professional assessment begins with contribution margin per order, category, customer segment and channel. Customer value, repeat purchases and the operational burden created by that revenue should then be considered. This reveals which growth should be accelerated and which growth merely increases workload. The market does not reward the online store with the most dashboards, but the one that uses the right figures to make concrete decisions.

Dropshipping Remains Viable, but Requires Mature Business Operations

The decline in the number of online stores does not mean that business models without owned inventory have no future. Dropshipping can actually be scalable when suppliers are reliable, product information is current and order and fulfillment processes are well integrated. Not having your own warehouse reduces certain fixed costs and inventory risks. However, it does not remove the commercial and legal responsibility for the customer.

A professional dropshipping store therefore has to do more than publish products from a supplier feed. It must add selection, positioning, pricing, content, customer service and quality control. When the same generic catalog is used by dozens of providers, there is very little room left for differentiation or price protection. The online store then becomes dependent on advertising and incidental price differences.

The main difference lies in the value added around the product. A specialized online store can explain products more effectively, offer relevant combinations and help customers make the right choice. It can also select suppliers based on delivery reliability, data quality and return handling. Dropshipping then becomes part of the operation instead of the entire commercial concept.

The inventory model does not determine whether an online store is professional. The quality of selection, customer responsibility, data and process control determines whether the model can operate sustainably.

Market developments are making the distinction between logistics models and business quality increasingly clear. Inventory-based sales, dropshipping and multichannel models can all be executed successfully or unsuccessfully. No model compensates for unclear positioning or a poor customer journey. The winner is not automatically the business that owns inventory, but the one that manages the entire chain more effectively.

Affiliate Marketing Is Taking On a Different Role in Mature E-commerce

Affiliate marketing remains relevant, but here too the market is shifting from simple reach toward demonstrable added value. Online stores do not only want more traffic, but primarily visitors who match their assortment and actually generate profitable orders. Affiliates that merely intercept generic discount seekers or branded traffic are therefore more likely to be questioned. Specialized content, comparison and advice retain greater value.

For online stores, it is important not to evaluate affiliate performance based on revenue alone. New customers, margins, returns, attribution and overlap with other channels must also be considered. An affiliate channel can register substantial revenue while creating only limited incremental demand. At the same time, a content-focused niche partner with lower volume may introduce highly valuable new customers.

The same professionalization taking place among online stores therefore also applies to their marketing ecosystem. Channels should not remain in place simply because they were once added, but because they fulfill a demonstrable role. This requires better data, clear agreements and an assessment that goes beyond the last click. Growth increasingly comes not from stacking reach, but from improving the quality of that reach.

The Next Phase of Growth Requires Choices and the Discipline to Stop

Many online stores respond to increasing competition by continually adding more. They open additional channels, import larger assortments, launch new campaigns and install additional tools. Activity increases, but so does the amount of data, management, exceptions and dependencies. Growth then becomes confused with expansion, while the organization becomes increasingly difficult to manage.

Professional growth also requires the discipline to stop. Product groups that structurally generate insufficient margin, channels that primarily create operational pressure and campaigns that fail to attract valuable customers should not continue indefinitely. Scalability is not created only by expanding successful components. It also comes from simplifying, redesigning or ending weak components in time.

This makes the current market correction relevant to every online store, even when its own revenue is still growing. The question is not only whether more is being sold, but whether the organization becomes stronger from that additional volume. Growth that requires increasingly more manual correction, discounting or advertising spend is less sustainable than growth created through better positioning and a more reliable supply chain. Revenue growth must become manageable growth.

From a Growing Market to a Stronger Online Store

The declining number of online stores and rising online revenue are not contradictory. Together, they show that the Dutch ecommerce market is entering its next phase. Online demand is still growing, but it is not distributed evenly across every business that can technically offer products online. Consumers and sales channels are placing higher demands on reliability, relevance and convenience.

Online stores that want to benefit from this development need to make sharper choices about where they add value. This requires a recognizable niche, reliable product and inventory data, profit-focused marketing, strong suppliers and processes that can scale without constant correction. Technology supports those choices, but cannot hide their absence. More tools do not solve an unclear business model.

For OnlineMarketingMan, this development confirms that scalable ecommerce does not begin with more products or more traffic. It begins with a commercial model in which positioning, automation, data and operational quality reinforce one another. The market still offers room for growth, including for specialized and smaller players. That room is simply becoming less available to online stores that continue to postpone professionalization.