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Year-End Gifting Wrap-Up for 2005
Typical gifter spent just under $2,000 buying gifts last year, reports Unity Marketing
Stevens, PA February 27, 2006 — Americans spent $1,934 buying gifts last year, according to the latest results of Unity Marketing’s quarterly gift tracking study. While the fourth quarter remains the most important season for gift purchases, the typical gifter spent less than half of their annual budget ($928) from October to December. Throughout the rest of the year, gifters spent an additional $1,006 buying gifts.
“Gifting is an important motivator for people to go shopping,” says Pam Danziger, president of Unity Marketing and author of Let Them Eat Cake: Marketing Luxury to the Masses — as well as the Classes. “Retailers tend to overlook the potential of the gifting market except for the final months of the year, while consumers are active shopping for gifts all year long. Birthdays, followed by anniversaries, new baby, friendship/thank you, and weddings are the top five gifting occasions. Christmas, Mother’s Day and Valentine’s Day are the most popular gift holidays.”
Gift Selections in Fourth Quarter Differed Markedly from the Rest of the Year
Throughout 2005, giftables were the most popular gift category. Giftables include such traditional gift items as candles, flowers, figurines, stationery, collectibles, seasonal decorations, gift for pets and other ‘gifty’ items. But during the fourth quarter, giftables declined to fourth place.
For the holiday gift season, entertainment and recreation gifts rose to first place for gifting. This category includes such items as books, toys, sporting goods, video/audio, DVD's and entertainment equipment, photographic equipment, computers, games, etc. In all of 2005, this was the second most popular gift category.
Clothing and fashion accessories rose to more prominence as a gift in the fourth quarter. Clothing and fashion accessories were the second most popular gift in the last three months of the year, while ranking in fourth place overall.
Store gift certificates and gifts of cash were the third most popular gift during both the fourth quarter and throughout the year.
“People make different gift choices depending upon the occasion for the gift. Holiday gift giving tends to be focused across a wider range of gift selections, while throughout the rest of the year, people think of giftables first. Retailers who want to capture a greater share of gift givers’ spending should look more closely at expanding their giftables offerings, targeting the $25 to $50 price range which is the spending sweet spot for a gift,” Danziger says.
The most popular giftable items in order of preference were candles and candle accessories; flowers, plants and garden accessories and decoratives; seasonal ornaments and decorations; gifts for pets; and figurines and sculpture.
About Gift Tracker Survey
Unity Marketing, on the forefront of market research on the gifting market, conducts a quarterly gift tracking study to measure the pulse of the gift consumer in a longitudinal survey of 500-600 gift buying consumers. Every quarter Unity tracks what gifts they bought during the past quarter, what gift occasions and holidays stimulated those purchases, how much they spent per holiday and occasion, where they bought gifts, the store and product brands they relied upon for gifts and their expectations for future purchases of gifts. The next Gift Tracker survey will be fielded early April 2006 to track 1Q2006 gift purchases.
The results of the quarterly Gift Tracker studies are compiled in an annual report called Gifting Report 2006: The Who, What, Where, How Much and Why of Gift Giving & Shopping, scheduled for publication in March/April 2006 .
Gift Tracker gives retailers and marketers that rely upon the gift market the ability to track the ups and downs in gift purchases in real-time and discover how their target market expects to spend their budgets for buying gifts over the next three months. In addition to the four quarterly tracking studies, marketers also receive a year-end summary of luxury gift consumers’ purchases and spending on the seven major gifting holidays, like Christmas, Mother’s Day and Easter and twelve gifting occasions, including birthdays, anniversary, wedding, friendship, showers, housewarming and other.
Categories included in the Gift Tracker survey include:
- Consumables, such as food, candy, wine, gift baskets, etc.
- Clothing and/or fashion accessories, such as handbags, shoes, wallets
- Jewelry and watches
- Personal care products, such as cosmetics, perfumes, bath products, etc.
- Home furnishings and household operations products, such as home furnishings, decorative accents, housewares, home textiles, china, glass and tableware, small household appliances, outdoor accents, etc.
- Giftables, such as flowers, candles, figurines, collectibles, greeting cards, stationery, seasonal decorations, and other popular gift items
- Entertainment and/or recreation goods, such as books, toys, sporting goods, video/audio, DVD’s and entertainment equipment, photographic equipment, computers, games, etc.
- Store Gift certificates and/or gifts of cash
- Gifts of experience, such as: spa treatments, dining and restaurants, vacations, trips, etc.
See more information on Gift Tracker. |
