NRF: 22.5% of Shoppers Planning to Buy Jewelry This Holiday Season

Some 52.8 percent of Americans have already started their holiday shopping, up from 51.4 percent last year, according to the National Retail Federation’s (NRF) holiday consumer spending survey conducted by BIGinsight.

Jewelers take note, when it comes to making purchases, fewer people are opting to take the goods on credit. The survey found shoppers prefer to use money they already have or have saved up to purchase holiday gifts to building debt.  This may have actually decreased the number of those who will buy jewelry.

Forty-three percent will rely on debit cards as their primary form of payment. An additional 25.2 percent will use cash and 2.8 percent will use a check. Nearly three in 10 (28.7 percent) will charge their gifts.

Once again, the Internet is playing an increasingly strong role in consumers’ shopping process. According to the survey, 47.3 percent of consumers said they will look for holiday gift ideas online, with 45.2 percent of respondents saying they will visit the stores for their gift inspiration.

Other popular areas for insight include advertising circulars (36.2 percent), television (35.4 percent) and friends and family (40.4 percent Proving they are still seen as a value to shoppers, more than one-third (34.1 percent) of consumers say they will seek ideas from catalogs. Additionally, 13.3 percent will head to Facebook and 5.8 percent will use Pinterest to gain inspiration. 

“Consumers are keen on scoring hot holiday deals this year, and exclusive apparel, electronics and toy promotions are making them all the more anxious,” said BIGinsight Consumer Insights director Pam Goodfellow.

“Trying to stay within budget, shoppers will map out their holiday season shopping strategy before stepping foot in any store or logging onto any website.”

The most popular gift choice is clothing and clothing accessories, with nearly six in 10 (59.7 percent) consumers saying they will splurge on fashion and apparel items and other accessories.

About the same amount of people (59.2 percent) will buy gift cards, which are also the most requested gift item.

Other popular items include toys (45.1 percent), CDs, DVDs, videos and video games (51.5 percent), electronics (31.7 percent), personal care or beauty items (24.4 percent) and food and candy (32.6 percent).