The Japan Direct Marketing Association (JADMA) said this week sales of online and catalog shopping in Japan have topped 10 trillion yen (90 billion U.S. dollars) in the fiscal year of 2020, for the first time partly due to the COVID-19 pandemic, Trend reports citing Xinhua.
According to the JADMA, the total sales of 820 direct sales establishments in the year through March 2021 increased 20.1 percent on the year to about 97 billion U.S. dollars.
Transactions through major online shopping websites such as Amazon and Rakuten remained robust.
People also utilized the Internet or telephone orders to buy food, home appliances and furniture as they refrained from going out or working from home.
The JADMA said this is the first time that the sales have exceeded the 10 trillion yen (90 billion U.S. dollars) mark since fiscal 1982, in which it started keeping the records.
The figure is equivalent to the joint sales of seven leading convenience store chains in Japan last year.
The JADMA also attributes the record sales to a rise in the number of customers and the entry of new service providers.