It appears Wal-Mart owns Easter.
Of the 79% of Americans who celebrate the holiday, 58.8% said they plan to make their Easter purchases in a discount store, according to a study released last week by the National Retail Federation.
This is compared to 3.6% who said they plan to do Easter shopping by catalog and 11.1% who said they would shop for the holiday online.
By comparison, while the discount store category also dominates Christmas shopping with 68.4% U.S. adults saying they planned to shop there last holiday season, catalogs and online stores get a significantly larger piece of the action.
In a study conducted at the start of last holiday shopping season, 44.3% of those surveyed said they planned to holiday shop by catalog in 2007 and 20% said they planned to buy online, according to the NRF.
“It makes sense if you think about it because Easter shopping is mostly food and candy,” said NRF spokeswoman Kathy Grannis.
Consumers this year will spend an average of $41.09 on food for Easter and $18.12 on candy, according to the NRF. Other strong categories are apparel and gifts, with consumers planning to spend an average of $23.82 on the former and 21.42 on the latter, according to the NRF.
In other categories, consumers are expected to spend $9.11 on flowers, $7.21 on decorations, 6.76 on greeting cards and $7.51 on “other,” according to the NRF.
Consumers are expected to spend a total of $14.44 billion overall this Easter, an average of $135.03 per individual. This is just pennies more than the $135.07 they were expected to spend in the same study last year, according to the NRF.
This Easter is the earliest since 1913, leaving apparel retailers hoping a chillier holiday won’t put a damper on shopping for new spring wardrobes.
“Easter is typically seen as the official kick-off to spring, when retailers debut new clothes and consumers are in the mood to buy for warmer weather,” said NRF President and CEO Tracy Mullin in a statement. ”Although this is one of the earliest Easter holidays on record, retailers are hoping that this year will be no different.”
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