UK households are projected to spend £792m (3.46%) less on Christmas this year than they did in 2011, but are still expected to spend approximately £22bn on gifts, cards and decorations, and food and drink this holiday season
According to a recent YouGov report on Christmas spending, the average UK household will spend £835 celebrating Christmas this year. This is down slightly from last year, when the average per-household spend was £865.
The biggest expense will be gifts for friends and family (£634), followed by food and drink (£161), and cards, trees and decorations (£40). The top three categories of Christmas gifts for UK consumers are books, clothing and music/DVDs.
The market intelligence report also found that UK households are planning on making the biggest savings on food and drink this Christmas; in 2011 the average food and drink spend was £176, which is 8.74% more than they are projected to spend this year.
Most can 'just about' afford Christmas
A separate YouGov survey found that just under half (48%) of the public say they can ‘just about’ afford Christmas, while 26% say they can easily afford Christmas and 12% say they cannot afford Christmas.
Commenting on the report, YouGov SixthSense Research Director James McCoy said:
“Considering the on-going economic uncertainty, it is no surprise that UK households are scaling back their Christmas spending this year. That aside they are still set to spend £22bn on gifts, decorations, and food and drink, which is a pretty remarkable sum and shows that Brits are determined not to let the recession dampen their Christmas celebrations too much. One interesting finding of this report that will likely be of concern to grocery retailers is that households are expected to scale back their food and drink spend by nearly 9% from last year.”
For more information contact YouGov press office via email or call us on +44(0)20 7012 6015.
See the full original press release here
