November 25, 2015
Expenses for the holiday season aren’t limited to gifts for others. Plenty of people also treat themselves with new furnishings or clothes or drop their cash on parties and entertainment.
Consumers in the Philadelphia region, however, expect to spend less on everything this year. A survey from Philly consulting firm Deloitte shows that local shoppers expect to decrease holiday spending in 2015 by 18 percent, even while national results show that Americans expect to pay 12.5 percent more.
Another Deloitte survey, released on Monday, finds American shoppers expect to spend almost 25 percent more this year on the Black Friday weekend alone.
“The folks in Philadelphia are still very generous this holiday season, but they're not spending as much as last year on themselves,” said Bill Park, a retail specialist at Deloitte.
The full holiday season survey, conducted online in mid-September, polled more than 4,000 people nationwide, including 405 people in Philadelphia and its suburbs.
When consumers predicted how much they would spend on gifts, socializing, furnishings and other holiday-related expenses, the bill came to an average of $1,249 for the Philadelphia area, compared to $1,462 nationwide.
Last year, Philadelphians planned to spend a lot more than other Americans: $1,532, versus the national average of $1,299.
“We're comparing against a very high year for Philadelphia last year," Park said.
The most common reason given for spending less is “we are living more responsibly.” The majority of respondents said their own economic situation had improved or was the same as last year, while 28 percent said it had gotten worse.
Don’t worry, though: Philly folks are not turning into Scrooges. The Philadelphia area still spends more on gifts than the national average, $533 compared to $487.
Nor are Americans becoming particularly more generous. Park noted that most of the increase in expected spending doesn’t come from increased gift-giving.
“When you look at where people are spending and where those increases are nationally, there's a very slight increase in gift spending but a real significant increase spending on yourself," he said.
In other words, Americans are taking the mantra “treat yo self” to heart.
