As grocery shopping through major retailers’ mobile shopping platforms is becoming a normal practice among Koreans, women in their forties are increasingly using mobile devices to buy their groceries.

According to the Ticket Monster social commerce site, 73 per cent of the company’s female customers made purchases through the company’s mobile platform in the first quarter of the year.

The figure represents a three per cent increase over the average for 2013 as a whole. Women in their thirties were the largest group of purchasers at 52.7 per cent, while women in their twenties and forties stood at 27.4 per cent and 16.1 per cent respectively.

However, purchases among women in their forties increased the most, with growth of 3.5 per cent, while sales among those in their twenties actually declined by 4.8 per cent.

These groups purchased groceries the most, including fresh food.

Customers of both sexes in their thirties were the most frequent buyers of fresh food through the Ticket Monster mobile platform with a 51 per cent share, compared to 23 per cent and 21 per cent for those in their forties and twenties respectively.

Ticket Monster saw its mobile platform fresh food sales grow threefold in the first quarter compared to the same period last year.