Ecommerce may be big business, but it’s still a drop in the bucket of total consumer sales. That’s why it’s pretty bold, and a little shocking, that consumer packaged goods giant Procter & Gamble went public with their online sales goal.  Their target? Multiplying their online sales by eight times, in the near future.

That number is huge for any company, but especially for one that sells products that don’t typically fly off of virtual shelves. Currently, Procter & Gamble sells about $500 million worth of their Pampers diapers, Pringles chips, Tide laundry detergents and other products, through ecommerce channels. Doing the math, a projection of 8x that number means they hope to move $4 billion worth of products per year.

So what’s to stop them? Well, there are a couple issues:

• As of now, people just don’t buy consumer packaged goods online: Well, of course they do, but not in huge numbers. Books? Yep. But snack foods? Even Walmart, who will sell any product to anyone, at any time, doesn’t sell Pringles through their online store.
• If they do sell more online, that means they’re selling less offline: Companies like Procter & Gamble work with third-party retailers  to sell their products. If they do a better job hawking their wares online, that means less people will buy them at the nearest Walmart. And that will make Walmart very angry. And you wouldn’t like Walmart when they’re angry.
• Consumers expect lower prices online: Hey, we consumers are a savvy bunch. We know that if a company sells online, that means they reduce lots of their costs…like store rent and check-out clerk paycheques. So then we tend to expect a lower price point. If P&G sells more of their products online, will they have to reduce the price and reduce the profit margin?

So will they succeed? Will we all suddenly decide to buy our diapers online instead of down at the diaper store (or wherever it is one buys those things)? Well, it’s hard to say. But we’ve certainly seen huge growth in all forms of eCommerce sales over the last couple years, and that trend is likely to continue. Only time will tell if forward thinking companies can help nudge their online sales into exponential growth.