Friday February 8, 2013

Boxed Chocolate Most Popular Valentine’s Day Gift

Cleveland — Candy is the number one Valentine’s Day gift, a survey by The NPD Group found while 78 percent of gift-givers will do their shopping less than a week in advance of the holiday, with 62 percent spending up to $100, according to a PriceGrabber survey.

Of the 38 percent of adults and 47 percent of teen Valentine's Day candy buyers, NPD’s survey shows 35 and 42 percent respectively will purchase chocolate and 55 and 45 percent respectively plan to buy boxed chocolates.

NPD also reports supermarkets and discount stores are the primary retail channels for Valentine’s Day shopping, while PriceGrabber notes 69 percent of consumers surveyed say they will shop in stores, up from 54 percent in 2012.

The number of people who will shop online has increased too, with 56 percent responding that they will make purchases through the internet, found PriceGrabber, a 22 percent increase from the past year.

PriceGrabber Vice-President of Marketing and Analytics Rojeh Avanesian explains: “Consumers continue to shop and conduct product research in advance of making purchases in order to find the best pricing on products. We expect this trend to continue as shoppers hit the stores and go online to make their Valentine’s Day gift purchases this year. Our survey showed that 36 percent of consumers plan to compare prices using their mobile phones when Valentine's Day gift shopping in brick-and-mortar stores, a jump from 29 percent in 2012.”