E-Commerce goes thru the roofand small businesses miss the baot.

I'm writing this as I wait for Windows to sort itself out. 17 months after my PC died and was reborn with new motherboard, processor and memory the original boot drive has gone to that place where all drives eventually go, hard drive heaven.

Whilst I try to get Windoze to install on a different drive, let me share some wowtastic ecommerce factoids relating to July 2007.

The 10 week run up to Christmas 2006 saw £7.7bn spent online. This was a 54% increase on the previous Christmas and in December the £1bn / week figure was smashed for the first time. For the whole year, £30.2bn was transacted online.

Now, in July 2007, £4.2bn was transacted online, a massive 80% increase on July 2006. Now, seeing phenomenal growth in online sales is nothing new, as seen in the Christmas illustration above. What is interesting is the comparison between this online growth and the growth figure for High St sales. For July 2007, High St sales grew just 3.3%

This demonstrates the importance and impact that on line retailing is having.

However, a survey last year by the Federation for Small Business (FSB) indicated that just 18% of SMEs (Small to Medium Sized Enterprises) were actually trading online.

To me, this just shouts "missed opportunity". All of those businesses not actively trading on line have to be loosing business to their competitors - they must be and yet they still continue to carry on as before. What they may not realise is that by doing nothing, they are not standing still - they are moving backwards and they should jump on the wave and join the ride or face hardship.

Now I know we have all heard the doom-sayers before, 7-8 years before, telling companies to get on line or die........however I think this statement is truer today than it was then and the statistics back it up too.

Not only that but 1m more users joined the information super highway in the UK in 2006, with over 31m of a population of 60m having web access, 84% of those getting online with a broadband connection.

So, the numbers of Internet users continues to climb, online transactions enjoy stellar rates of growth and yet 82% of SMEs don't think this is for them.

WAKE UP AND SMELL THE COFFEE.

Even putting together an online store is not overly expensive these days - and anyway - what is the cost if an online store is not launched?

Cars, cars and more cars -but preferably black, red or silver

OK, so I need to own up, not only am i a self confessed geek but I'm also a bit of a petrol-head as well and over the past couple of months I have been lucky enough to see some really rare cars.

It's not every day that I see an Aston Martin but compared to the following cars, Astons are as common as.......I have seen 4 cars in the past few weeks that are rarer than hens teeth - the types of car that one may only ever see once or twice on the road in a lifetime of driving, cars that are masters of the art of vehicle design.....that have (at some point in their history) redefined a genre. So, enough of the blabbing and on to the steel (or thermo-plastic or carbon fibre).

The first of these cars that I saw was dubbed "Il Mostro" by the Italian press, "The Monster" and surprisingly enough it was not a Ferrari or a Lamborghini but an Alfa Romeo. Now, Alfa's are nice enough (the latest ones are really good looking cars in the right colour) but Il Mostro was something different.

In the late 80's Alfa were struggling with their identity and so asked 3 design houses to come up with a Concept Car. The monster was born - although officially it was the Alfa Romeo SZ or "Sprint Zagato Experimental Sportscar 3.0 litre" to give it its full title.

Only 1,036 were ever made and by today's standards of 500-600HP motors the 210 HP 3ltr engine seems pretty tame. However, back in the 80s this was "good stuff" and when mated to a lightweight body, the performance was pretty good. (152MPH top speed 0-62mph in around 6 seconds).

And then there were the looks - only available in "Rosso Alfa", Alfa Red, the car looks stunning and purposeful. Saw this car on a family trip whilst driving around South Wilts / North Somerset.

Next is a supercar Tour-du-Force. When Mercedes wanted to design and build the ultimate Mercedes, they turned to UK company, McLaren for help. Already Partners in the McLaren Mercedes Formula 1 team, the request was a natural one, particularly in light of McLaren's record in the SuperCar business - having already designed and built McLaren F1 supercar, one time holder of the record for being the fastest production car.

And so the Mercedes Benz SLR McClaren was born.

Combining Mercedes Benz style and quality with McLarens proven SuperCar design and engineering skills and the engine design skills of AMG, the SLR is probably the fastest car with an automatic gearbox!

It's gull-wing doors hark back to the MB 300SLR of 1955 and this car is powered by a 5.4ltr V8 developing 617 Hp which provides almost rocket-ship levels of performance. 0-62mph reached in 3.5 seconds and on to a top speed of 210mph.

Also saw this rocket ship in South Wiltshire.

One weekend in August we went to a classic car show at Wroughton Airfield and revelled in the sounds of a load of AC Cobras, saw plenty of Jenson Interceptors and other lovely classics but a few days after, saw a genuine Ford GT40 on the road.

Back in the 60s Ford attempted to buy Ferrari for their sports car experience. The takeover was rebuffed and in frustration, Ford decided to take Ferrari to task and to design a sports car with the sole purpose of winning the Le Mans 24 hour race. That was the design brief, the result was the F40. So named because it is just 40" high. And, yes - it went on to beet Ferrari at LeMans, not just once but in 4 consecutive years. In the first year, the car was co-driven by Bruce McClaren - who went on to form the McClaren F1 team. The car was also produced for sale and a legend was made.

Originally powered by a 4.2ltr V8 engines of up to 7.0ltrs were fitted as the car evolved. Although not as rare as the other cars featured here, the GT40 is still an exciting and rare site on our roads.

And last but not least, spotted on the M4 motorway this very lunchtime, a very distinctive SuperCar, the Pagani Zonda. Built in Italy by Pagani at the rate of just 25 per year, this is a mid-engined 2 seater that has been designed and built by a brand new company with just motoring excellence in mind. Using a 7.3 ltr AMG tuned Mercedes V12 with 594 Hp and can reach 62mph in 3.7 seconds and tops out at 214mph. Stellar performance.

A real rarity on our roads. it was almost a pleasure to see this car. I say almost because the orange that it was painted in did not really suit the car. It's the type of orange you can see nearly everyday on the Ford Focus RS.