Buying clothing or decorative items without leaving your couch has become commonplace. What is less common is the way online shopping habits are transforming right now. The average basket size is declining, transactions are multiplying, and the fashion and decoration categories are not following the same trend at all. Understanding these discrepancies helps make better choices when navigating online stores.
Online Decoration and Fashion: Two Markets Not Advancing at the Same Pace
It is often assumed that e-commerce progresses uniformly. The figures tell a different story. According to the Fevad report on e-commerce in France for 2025, online sales of furniture and decoration have increased by 3%, and home textiles by 2.9%.
Clothing and shoes, on the other hand, have slightly declined by 0.5%. In other words, online decoration is growing while fashion is stagnating.
Several possible explanations. Remote work remains ingrained in habits, prompting investments in home interiors. For fashion, competition between second-hand platforms and traditional retailers fragments demand. The concrete result: online stores specializing in decoration are now attracting customers who previously returned to physical stores.
This context benefits sites that blend the two worlds. On the online store Les Tendances de Mya, for example, fashion and decoration coexist in the same catalog, reflecting how many consumers navigate: they look for a dress, then switch to a cushion or a lamp.
Online Shopping: Buying More Often, but Spending Less on Each Order
French e-commerce surpassed 3.2 billion transactions in 2025, an increase of 10%. At the same time, the average basket size declined by 3%, falling to 62 euros. This paradox deserves attention.
Shoppers are fragmenting their purchases instead of filling a large basket. Specifically, someone who would have ordered a lamp, two cushions, and a blanket all at once now places three separate orders over several weeks.
Why this change? Several reasons are at play:
- Free shipping from low thresholds (sometimes from the first item) removes the incentive to consolidate purchases.
- Flash sales and private sales encourage ordering as soon as an offer appears, without waiting to have a complete list.
- Budgetary constraints are tighter: people prefer to test a low-priced product before committing to a more expensive purchase.
For those looking for fashion and decoration trends, this logic of micro-purchases changes the way new items are discovered. There is more exploration, more comparison, and time taken to check the quality of a first item before returning to the same store.
AI Recommendations: A Filter to Use with Caution
Online stores are increasingly integrating recommendation tools based on artificial intelligence. You have probably already seen these sections “you may also like” or “personalized selection” at the bottom of a product page.
71% of consumers are concerned about the use of their personal data in this context, and 57% doubt the commercial neutrality of the displayed suggestions, according to figures reported by Fevad.
In practice, the algorithm does not always distinguish a real decoration trend from a product that the seller has paid to promote. Two simple reflexes can help maintain control:
- Check if the recommended product also appears in independent editorial selections (decor magazines, non-sponsored specialized accounts).
- Compare the displayed price with that offered by other sites for the same item or an equivalent item.
- Look at customer reviews by filtering for intermediate ratings (3 and 4 stars), which are often more nuanced and useful than the extremes.
AI remains a practical tool for discovering products that one might not have searched for themselves. The trap is to confuse algorithmic recommendation with real trends.
Online Second-Hand: A Decoration and Fashion Reflex Impacting Trends
Second-hand is no longer limited to clothing. Vinted, online recycling centers, and digital consignment shops now offer furniture, vintage tableware, and decorative items. This market is changing the very notion of trend.
A 1970s rattan chair, unavailable in new stores, can become a sought-after product thanks to its visibility on these platforms. Second-hand creates its own decoration trends by reintroducing forgotten styles.
Vintage Fashion and Retro Decoration: The Same Mechanisms
In fashion, the phenomenon is identical. Vintage pieces (leather jackets, geometric patterned dresses, brass accessories) circulate among buyers and establish aesthetic codes that new brands eventually adopt in their collections.
For the consumer, this means that following trends no longer solely involves ready-to-wear sites or decoration brands. Exploring second-hand platforms is part of the monitoring process, just like consulting a seasonal catalog.
The distinction between fashion shopping and decoration shopping is becoming increasingly blurred. Online shoppers move from one universe to another within the same session, guided by their news feed, an algorithm, or simply by curiosity. Maintaining a critical eye on recommendations, fragmenting purchases for better testing, and incorporating second-hand into searches: these three habits are enough to get the best out of online shopping without falling prey to its biases.
