It’s good news for ecommerce sellers but rather grim reading for humanity in general. Apparently £1bn of Christmas presents in the UK will be unwanted and passed on according to ICM research.
38 million people in UK will sell-on, re-gift or give away presents and 26% will sell presents for cash, most commonly on eBay. Thankfully 37% will re-gift presents to other people. Don’t forget your local food bank if you have something you don’t need.
According to the survey, colleagues, aunts, uncles and neighbours are the worst culprits, suggesting it’s time to kill off Secret Santa in the office, or start a gift amnesty in your street and donate money to charity instead.
The survey notes that women are more enterprising with 70% willing to sell or pass on presents compared to only 48% of men who are more loyal recipients.
The top two reasons people get rid of their gifts are because they already have the item (69%) or have no need for it (65%) suggesting many gift-givers are not really thinking about who they are buying for.
Daniel Ball, spokesperson for Wax Digital said: “These findings suggest that we’re not thinking hard enough about what we’re buying and for whom at Christmas. It’s a frivolous time of year but £1bn is still a huge amount of money to waste on unwanted gifts and could be better spent.”
