Go ahead, admit it. You’d rather buy your own Christmas gifts.
That’s what the research indicates, anyway. For the fourth consecutive year, gift cards top the list of most requested items this year, on the basis of surveys conducted for the National Retail Federation by BIGresearch of Worthington, Ohio.
The company forecasts total gift-card purchases will reach $24.78 billion this year and puts the average that each U.S. shopper will spend on the cards at $145.61, up from $139.91 last year.
And thanks to a law Congress enacted last year, shoppers don’t need to rush to use the gift. The cards cannot expire in less than five years, and no inactivity fees can be imposed for one year.
“The cards are going to hold their value longer,” said Craig Shearman, spokesman for the retail federation. But, he added, “It’s meant to be spent; it’s meant to be enjoyed.”
The new law also has provided fuel to a secondary market for the cards on the Internet, for recipients who would rather have some cash and buyers looking for, say, a $50 gift card for $40 to shop at a store they already frequent.
A survey by the NPD Group Inc. of Port Washington, N.Y., found that 34 percent of shoppers plan to buygift cards this year, with more women than men leaning toward gift-card purchases.
“This year, more than ever, there’s really a challenge for consumers to decide what to get,” said Marshal Cohen, NPD Group’s chief industry analyst.
If a shopper knows the recipient is into video games, but doesn’t know which games, a gift card takes care of it, he said.
BIGresearch’s survey, which polled 8,778 consumers Nov. 3-9, found that more than 77 percent of shoppers will buy a gift card this year. Department stores will be the leading beneficiaries, with 39.2 percent of those surveyed intending to buy cards there,followed by restaurants at 33.4 percent and electronics stores at 19 percent.
Stuck with a card you really don’t want? (Cohen said he’s probably got two dozen in his desk drawer.) Checkout sites like giftcardgranny. com, a comparison shopping site that tells you what your card could be worth.
Giftcardgranny lets you compare offers for the cards from four other websites. Cards for big retailers with a lot of locations tend to draw the highest bids.
Last week, for example,Wal-Mart gift cards were fetching 90 percent of face value on three of the four sites and 70 percent on the fourth.
Simon Jobman, Web manager for giftcardgranny, said the year-old operation is gaining traction.
“We’ve really noticed an increase in traffic just in the past few months,” he said. He attributes much of the traffic gain to increased purchases of cards.
“That’s what we’re really kind of banking on with this site, just the popularity of gift cards,” he said.
Target cards were trading at 92 percent of value on twosites and at 89 percent and 70 percent on the other two. Dillard’s cards were going from 65 percent to 80 percent among the sites. JC Penney was at 76 percent at three, 65 percent at the fourth.
Business, Pages 73 on 11/28/2010