For Christmas 2009, pets win--and spouses lose! Kids are in the middle.

Do we love Rover more than Robert?

Last week Britt Beemer, founder and chairman of America’s Research Group made a startling announcement about expected holiday retail spending.  What he revealed was eye-opening about what consumers plan to do, expenditure-wise.  In addition, since year-end purchases are predicated on who the gift recipient is, it is also interesting to see who’s high on the list and who’s not!

First, according to Beemer, 50.1% of parents plan to reduce spending on gifts to each other.  Last year this figure was 44.4%, so apparently spouses have sunk even lower on the gift list!  What puts this in perspective is that in 2007 only 6% of spouses said they’d reduce spending on gift for each other, so this year there is a nine-fold increase in loss of interest in buying for at least those kind of special people in consumers’ lives!  “Parents want to maintain gift-spending levels for their kids, so they are showing more willingness to trim on each other,” say Beemer. 

In a separate report by Consumer Reports, for females who plan to decrease their spending this season, 22% said they’d decrease their spending on gifts for their spouse—only 14% said they planned to reduce gifts for their pets! 

Beemer’s retail-consulting firm is also pointing to a roughly 3% decline in holiday sales; last year the drop was 2.7%.  “I know some analysts are predicting positive numbers, but I just don’t see it working out as well,” Beemer says. It’s hard to say what the future of sales this season will turn out to be, but Mr. Beemer’s track-record is pretty solid:  he’s been accurate within a half of 1% in 17 or the last 18 holiday seasons! 

Happy holidays greetings to all—but especially to spouses, for it looks like they’ll need the cheery salute!  The dog, apparently won’t. 

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