Fashion, the category in which spending will be cut the most
MADRID, 25 Oct. (EUROPA PRESS) -
The Spaniards will reduce their budget for gifts this Christmas by 14%, mainly due to the impact of inflation, according to data from the report 'Purchase trends in high season', carried out by Packlink.
Specifically, this cost containment translates into approximately 900 million euros less among Spanish consumers, compared to the past 2021.
In this sense, at a European level, Spain will be one of the countries that will reduce its spending the most, below the United Kingdom (22%) and above Italy (12.3%), France (11.5%) and Germany ( 9.4%).
Also, businesses and consumers will be affected by rising costs. Nine out of ten (91.9%) companies expect to be affected by higher costs in the high season, while 58% of consumers expect to cut spending on non-food products due to the increase in the cost of living.
"It is logical that one of the first measures taken by Spanish and European consumers is to bet on savings to alleviate the rise in prices. However, the sector remains optimistic regarding the volume of sales and activity, although citizens will bet on products cheaper", explained Packlink's marketing director, Noelia Lázaro.
In the current economic context, 24% of Spaniards point to inflation as the main reason for containing Christmas spending and are above economic uncertainty (21.55%), insufficient savings (16.49%) , the lack of available credit (9.72%), the loss of profits (9.53%) and the rise in interest rates (6.58%).
However, Spain is not the European country where the increase in prices is most worrying. According to the study, the Germans are the ones who consider this problem the most important (37.50%), above the United Kingdom (32.51%), France (32.67%) and Italy (25.06%).
The product categories that will suffer the most spending cuts at European level are: clothing (26%), above electronics (22.3%), toys (20.9%) and household items (19, 8%). For their part, health and beauty products (17.4%) and DIY and gardening (16.1%) stand out as the categories in which the least will be cut.
In Spain, fashion (26.7%) also remains the category that will suffer the most cuts, above toys (20.4%), DIY and gardening (19.6%), health and beauty products (18%), household products (16.8%) and, finally, electronics (16.8%).
This situation will also cause changes in consumption habits. Thus, Spanish consumers are the ones who plan to make the most purchases through the 'offline' channel, at 37.7%. However, the United Kingdom and Italy are the ones with the highest forecast for purchases in online channels, both with 26% of the intentions.
The report also collects, among the more than 8,000 respondents, about 800 statements from retail professionals. In Spain, the 226 retailers interviewed indicate that many companies have already decided to take measures to alleviate expenses.
Among the measures adopted, at a global level, they range from the increase in shipping costs (34.7%), change in delivery times (26.2%), to the increase in promotions (18.1%), the elimination of free returns (10.1%) or the growth of the workforce (3.3%).
