The Maze: Selling online in Europe does not mean choosing the same route to customers. In the European E-commerce Report 2026's 2025 figures, 65% of Italian businesses with web sales use marketplaces, compared with 27% in France. Marketplaces let businesses sell through a shared shopping site; their own websites or apps provide a separate route. These figures cover enterprises with at least ten employees. They count businesses using a channel, not the money flowing through it. The commercial question is where to build a sales presence, rather than which country spends most online.
Italy and France start from different channel habits. The report puts marketplace adoption 38 percentage points higher in Italy: 65% versus 27%. That is more than twice the proportion of online-selling businesses, but it does not establish that an Italian seller earns twice as much through marketplaces. For a brand considering expansion, the difference indicates how commonly local online sellers already operate on shared shopping platforms. It is a useful starting point for choosing which selling capabilities to investigate, rather than a ready-made revenue forecast.
The contrast extends beyond the two neighbours. Poland stands at 64%, almost level with Italy. Germany follows at 51%, Spain at 36% and the Netherlands at 32%. These are six selected countries, not Europe's top six: the full report places Lithuania at 87%. A single European launch template would therefore enter markets with visibly different patterns of business participation. The evidence does not identify which marketplaces these firms use, or whether a new brand's product category follows the national pattern. Those are the next questions before committing a sales budget.
France's lower marketplace adoption comes alongside widespread direct selling. Among the same population of online-selling enterprises, 94% in France use their own website or app, compared with 73% in Italy. A business can use both channels. For example, a seller may take an order through its own store and another through a marketplace; it would count in both groups. The figures therefore do not divide each market into two exclusive camps. Nor do they show French businesses selling less online. They show a different combination of routes among businesses already making web sales.
A channel's popularity does not settle its economics. A marketplace can put a seller in front of customers already shopping there, while an owned store lets the seller manage the purchase experience directly. Choosing between them, or operating both, involves different work and costs. The 2025 comparison measures neither customer acquisition costs nor fees, margins or repeat buying. Our interpretation is that the relevant expansion decision concerns the channel mix and the capabilities it requires. A marketplace-heavy Italian peer group is a reason to examine local platform operations, not proof that a marketplace-first launch will be profitable.
Why it matters: European expansion can reuse a product while needing a different route to its buyers. The Italy–France contrast supports testing channel priorities country by country. It does not support copying national adoption percentages into a sales forecast. For a brand, the useful follow-up is category-level evidence on where its customers buy and what each route leaves after costs. The border is close; the operating assumptions may be far apart.
