- Sarah Knapp

Consumer won’t just be scouting gifts for friends and family come Black Friday. According to a Consumer Reports Holiday Poll, 66 percent of shoppers will be buying something for themselves.

Drawing on the responses of more than 1,000 adults received at the beginning of November, the poll found that 51 percent of adults plan on going shopping Thanksgiving weekend.

"This is the first time we've asked about the shopping for yourself issue because Black Friday has become an extended period. It started a month ago already -- it can't just be gift shopping, it's too long," said Ed Farrell, director of market research for Consumer Reports. "This probably occurred every year in the past, but this year it's likely to be more considering that retail has been hurting, especially for the past three months. There's a lot of pent-up demand.”

The most popular categories for self-shopping are food and wine, electronics and clothing. Of the 45 percent of shoppers who buy food and wine, 71 percent will be picking up something for themselves or buying to share. Seventy percent of shoppers will be buying electronics, with 78 percent of those buying as gifts and 55 percent as self-purchases. Overall, the most popular shopping item will be clothing with 71 percent of shoppers planning on buying. Of those shoppers, 46 percent will be buying some for themselves.

Toys are one thing that consumers are least likely to buy for themselves, as 98 percent of shoppers plan to buy toys as gifts and only 3 percent will buy toys for themselves.

Gender also plays a role in self-purchases. Men are more likely to buy video games or accessories, electronics, and recreation/fitness equipment for themselves. Women will splurge on buying food, wine or clothing for themselves. Age also contributes to how consumers will shop for themselves, as 51 percent of shoppers age 18-34 buying for themselves plan to buy electronics. Forty-five percent of those 55-plus will buy food and wine for themselves.
 
Consumers are also much more likely to be shopping for themselves in stores (28 percent) than online (14 percent).  "Shopping in stores is part of a culture, it's just the way we're wired. Online is handy if you know exactly what you want to get. What you don't have is the browsing experience. It's better to have people in the store than online in terms of exposing people to things that they didn't even know they wanted," added Farrell. "It very well could be that people will buy more for themselves when they go into stores: people set up budgets for gifts but not always expressly for themselves."


Nielsen Business Media