Many online retailers are relatively new and may not possess a long operating history. This lack of history may result in the purchaser not having all the information he/she needs which may lead to consumer distrust. According to Holmstrom (1985), consumer distrust results when purchasers face perceived risks concerning the value of the product. These circumstances add to a level of significant mistrust between commercial online purchasers and sellers (Weigelt & Camerer, 1988). Despite the popularity and prevalence of the Internet very little is actually known about the web-based sports retail-marketing online activities. The purpose of this investigation was to better understand why consumers may not purchase sport merchandise online. This study employed an online survey that was posted on the World Wide Web from November, 2002 to March, 2003 attracting 1035 responses. Of the 1035 responses, 476 (46%) responded that they had never merchandise or memorabilia online. The respondents were asked to provide reasons why they have not purchased sport merchandise online. The reasons were collapsed into categories reflecting perceived value and selection/security issues. A Pearson’s r correlation was used to determine the relationship between never previously purchasing sport merchandise online and the aforementioned categories. The results indicated significant relationships (p<.01) existed between the consumer not having previously purchased online and the perceived value of the sport merchandise online. Hierarchical multiple regressions were conducted to identify specifically why the respondents did not purchase and value of sport merchandise online. The regression analyses indicated that the respondents perceived: a) online prices and shipping prices as being too high; b) a delay in receiving the product; c) prevention of sampling the product prior to purchase; and d) lack of sport product sales or discounts as the specific, primary reasons for not purchasing sport merchandise online. Because the main objective of e-commerce sites is to turn browsers into buyers the sport marketer, whether in the cyber-world or the physical-world, needs to understand the consumer and their attitude towards the purchase of sport merchandise. For consumer acceptance to occur, product value is a critical component for online shopping to reach its true growth potential (Scheraga, 2001). This study contributes to the understanding of online sports consumer attitude if sport marketers are to take advantage of this retail medium in the future. Keyword(s): sport management