I read a striking statistic today. Spending on food and drinks is supposed to increase by 11.6 percent this holiday season – greater than any other category measured in a survey conducted by marketing firm IBISWorld. Total spending on gifts is shrinking by 2.6 percent.
That means the food at your friend’s holiday party is going to kick ass, but she won’t be giving you a present. To be fair, during this holiday season total spending on gifts ($82 billion) still whomps spending on food ($28 billion). But still – people are pulling back dramatically on gifts. The recession is over, folks!
“More people are pulling back the need to shop for unnecessary goods,” said Toon van Beeck, an analyst at IBISWorld. “It’s not all about giving someone a gift, but going back towards family values and spending time with friends.”
I’m curious if the BargainBabe.com community is pulling back their gift giving, or defying the trend.
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Welcome to Bargain Babe! I’m Mara, and I’m so glad you’re here. I am an obsessive bargain hunter and penny pincher, and I am determined to live a full life without EVER paying full price.
The food at Thanksgiving time is often more costly. Hot dogs and beans are not served. Disappointed in your remark ” kicks @$$”, comparing food and gift giving at Thankgiving and holiday time. Don’t try and be a tennager.
I’ve been trying to cutback for several years. Unfortunately, my mother goes into guilt producing overdrive & stresses me to the max. I have been able to cut my grandkids to a small stipend or gift card instead of the massive gift overload. Thank goodness retirement doesn’t allow for that anymore. Yes. I am retired & my mother still drives me nuts! LOL
I have already discussed this with a coworker and we have decided to give homemade bagels for gifts this year. We’ll give a basket of bagels with a nice note to departments and individual bags to people closer to us. Since we work together, this co-gifting won’t seem strange or odd. Overall, we estimate that it will cost us between $10 and $20 to do this. That is compared to years past where work related gifts would easily stretch to nearly $100. It’s cheap… but people like meaningful gifts and food is always nice. No one remembers a stupid knick-knack and card anyway.
My family has already discussed a reduced gift giving Christmas this year so I expect that to be similar.
PS. William, I know tons of teenagers who are hesitant to type or say the word “ass” but very few adults with that same disorder. And I know many people in the 20-30s age group (and some even older) who find the phrase “kick ass” to be part of the common vernacular. I know you may not “like” such language but you don’t need to police other adults around you.
The kids in our extended family are all grown now (except one 13 year old), and with the smaller/less secure cash on hand, we’ve decided to return to our memories of when we were kids…we’re limiting our gifts to toys not costing more than $20.00.. That’s right, toys! Not electronics, not battery opperated, but toys we find from yester-year, (think slinkys. rag dolls, whirley tops, beautiful marbles, music boxes…any toy that brings a fond memory) I found that there are some great finds on the Vermont Country Store site. The challenge is to find a toy that will bring joy to the recipient (and won’t cost more than $20.00). I think we will have fun, just goofing around with the toys, and maybe recapturing the joy we felt as kids on Christmas morning…
The kids in our extended family are all grown now (except one 13 year old), and with the smaller/less secure cash on hand, we’ve decided to return to our memories of when we were kids…we’re limiting our gifts to toys not costing more than $20.00. That’s right, toys! Not electronics, not battery operated, but toys we find from yester-year. (think slinkys. rag dolls, chutes and ladders, whirley tops, beautiful marbles, music boxes, erecto-sets, Q-pie dolls,…any toy that brings a fond memory). There are some great finds on Vermont Country Store, but also ebay and other sites. The challenge will be in finding the perfect toy for each family member, but I think it will be fun goofing around with our new “toys,” and recapturing those feelings we had as children, on Christmas morning…
Sorry you had to read that twice… the editing option was not working, apparently!
I love the toy for grown-ups idea. My teenage kids love to go through the toy catalogs that come in the Sunday paper. I’ve always bought each of them a toy each Christmas usually a board game or something that we can all play. After all the individual gifts are opened we can still look forward to settling down to more family time. As well, I have a single friend who gets a toy every Christmas…whatever it is, it’s his favorite gift of the season! And yes, there are still toy bargains out there!