Foodstuffs once again are the
most popular Christmas present in Italy, with 74.7% of shoppers
spending money on them, followed by clothing, (46.2%) and toys
(45.4%), according to a survey by the Confcommercio retailers'
association together with Format research.
Spending on travel is up 4% compared to 2014, while books
are up 2.4% and personal wellbeing spending, which went down
last year, is up by 4.4% this year.
Fewer people are buying smartphones, but more are buying
videogames and computers while the overall percentage of
consumers who plan to buy Christmas presents is stable at 85.9%.
People buying presents are predominatly the young, the very
young and people aged over 55 rather than young families or
married people with children aged 35 to 44 living in big cities
who will spend less.
Average spending per head for Christmas will be 5% up
compared to last year, with 56% of people buying gifts in
traditional shops and 75.3% buying in big chain stores.
Most marked this year is use of the Web for buying
Christmas presents with 39.6% saying they will buy theirs on
Internet compared to 3.8% in 2009.
Of those, 26.9% will choose clothing, 21.9% books, 16.3%
children's toys, and 15.3% cellphones and smartphones.
In terms of total budget, 95.2% of consumers will not spend
more than 300 euros on presents, the survey showed.
More people this year will spend between 100 and 300 euros,
62.4% compared to 61.9% last year.
Average spending this year is expected to be higher
slightly, 166 euros rather than 158 euros last year, the survey
said.
Some 4.9% said they are spending more this year compared to
1.8% last year, which Confcommercio said was "still low but a
significant enough" increase.
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