Retail trade up 8% in January
Retail sales revenue in Estonia totaled €885 million in January, Statistics Estonia said. Year over year, sales volume increased by 8 percent, although food sales remained in decline.
Statistics Estonia analyst Johanna Linda Pihlak said that while sales volume in December remained unchanged compared with December 2024, it began to grow in January.
"The increase in sales volume in January was driven primarily by companies engaged in the retail sale of motor fuel where volume rose by 24 percent compared with the same month in 2025. This was mainly due to lower motor fuel prices," Pihlak added.
"Sales revenue of companies engaged in the retail sale of motor fuel includes not only fuel sales but total sales, which also cover revenue from food as well as other goods and services," Pihlak clarified.
In stores selling manufactured goods, sales volume increased by 13 percent compared with January 2025, while in food stores it decreased by 2 percent.
"The decline in sales volume at food stores continued to be influenced by rising food prices," Pihlak said.
Compared with December, the sales volume of retail trade enterprises fell by 14 percent in January.
"This was a typical decline following the high sales volumes during the Christmas and New Year period," Pihlak explained.
According to seasonally and calendar-adjusted data, sales volume increased by 4 percent compared with the previous month.
Retail trade data publication revised
Starting in 2026, Statistics Estonia will no longer publish data on several specific retail trade activities, instead releasing them under more general categories. The change is related to the introduction of the new classification of economic activities, EMTAK 2025.
Statistics Estonia will continue to publish retail data under the EMTAK 2008 classification until the end of 2027, but the business register has used only the EMTAK 2025 version since 2025.
The central principle of EMTAK 2025 is that classification is based on what is sold, whereas EMTAK 2008 is based on the sales channel through which the sale takes place (store, market or online shop). As a result, it is not always possible to establish a one-to-one correspondence between EMTAK 2008 and EMTAK 2025 and the data is no longer comparable due to the lack of information about a company's sales channel.
For example, under EMTAK 2008, a company selling goods by mail order or online may, under EMTAK 2025, instead fall under the retail sale of electronics, clothing or household goods, depending on the products sold. Because registries do not contain information about sales channels, it is difficult to classify a company under the activity "Retail sale via mail order or internet."
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Editor: Marcus Turovski
