With Black Friday offers now often stretching across the entire week preceding Thanksgiving, bargain hunters have already started their quest for the best deals, always looking to save a few bucks while spending a lot. And while analysts are once again expecting record levels of e-commerce sales this holiday season, physical retail still has a role to play during the holiday shopping season.
According to the National Retail Federation’s Holiday Survey, consumers are expected to spend an average of $997 over the holiday season this year. When it comes to where they’ll be splashing the cash, 57 percent of people said they’d shop online while 47 percent plan to go to a department store. 44 percent are planning to shop at a discount store while 43 percent are going to make holiday purchases in a grocery store.
Powering up the laptop, opening a nice bottle of wine and doing all of the holiday shopping online is a tempting option for many Americans, more than ever in light of the pandemic. However, it seems like physical stores are still appealing to many shoppers, especially during the holiday season, when the store radio plays holiday classics at full blast and it’s easy to catch a bit a bit of holiday fever.
This chart shows where U.S. consumers plan to shop in the 2021 holiday season.
