Bleak Look at Black Friday - Or is the Glass Half Full?

A survey focused on consumer's 2009 holiday spending outlook by Burst Media finds that 62.8% of consumers plan to spend the same or cut back on their holiday purchases compared to 2008. Although most consumers plan to hold on tight to their spending this holiday season, 85.3% of respondents will be doing their shopping online. This number is on the rise from year to year.

Only 14.6% of respondents expect to spend more this holiday season than they did in 2008, while 32.7% expect to spend less and 30.1% expect to spend about the same as they did last year. Interestingly, this year finds that women will be more frugal than men this holiday season with 38.1% planning to spend less on gifts and entertainment, compared to 27.3% of all men. But you can look to this as slightly behind because the study was before the announcement of some solid gaming releases. Also, there were more newer gadgets last year, with the new i-phone 3g, than this year.

The income segments that will trim holiday spending this year looks like this:
• 29.5% of respondents reporting household income (HHI) of less than $35,000 cutting holiday spending,
• 46.3% of households reporting HHI of $35,000-$75,000
• 31.3% of households reporting HHI of $75,000 or more

The Internet has become a go-to holiday shopping resource. Despite the fact that 63% of consumers express concern over credit card security when making an online purchase, seven out of ten still plan to make an online holiday purchase on the Internet. Consumers will also use the Internet to "window shop". The most popular online window-shopping activities are comparing different retailers to find the best price (56.8%), and comparing the features of different brands (55.3%).

The Burst study also found that there does not seem to be a clear start to the holiday shopping season as only 13.6% respondents consider "Black Friday" (the day after Thanksgiving) to be the official kick-off.

Many experts feel that with such uncertainty to when the actual shopping season will begin, advertisers should take advantage of creating awareness now.

(Source: Center for Media Research)