It is clear that many households are still under financial pressure, forcing retailers to react. The shift in positioning of many retailers christmas ads is just another example of this.
Personally I think it is encouraging to see many retailers, including Marks & Spencer and Tesco, dropping celebrities 'in favour of family Christmas campaigns' - conveying the emotion of the festive season and attempting to buoy the spirits of customers tired of austerity messages.
M&S has also dropped its use of celebrities - for the first time in 12 years - while Waitrose has not even produced a Christmas ad as such, promising that funds that would have been used to produce "fancy" Christmas ads will be donated to good causes instead.
"This is the golden quarter," says Steve Sharp, M&S's head of marketing. "It's make or break for most retailers and the spend on the ads is in proportion to the commercial importance of the season." (quote taken from Guardian article).
Interestingly, figures from Metapack (an e-commerce delivery management system company) suggest that the Christmas peak will be later this year, more in line with the 2010 trend, which was affected significantly by severe weather conditions.
“Consumer confidence is resulting in people leaving their Christmas shopping until later in the year. More online sales will move from November into December” explains Patrick Wall, MetaPack Founder and CEO. “There was mild weather last year and the delivery quality was generally high. Consumers are expecting the same this year.”
This week (w/c 12th Nov) MetaPack expect to see week-on-week sales increase by nearly 30% and the following week, increase again, by over 35%. The cumulative effect is an increase of over 150% between September and the end of November - staggering numbers.
A recent study has found that british families will spend, on average, £478.50 on Christmas this year - down five per cent from last year - with the recession being the main driver, along with the need to combat high fuel costs. 24% of families plan to reduce the visits to family and friends over the Christmas period in order to achieve this.
With cut backs and consumers delaying their Christmas purchases, things that money can't buy - the time with family, and those special moments - become even more important. I believe that this will continue to drive the 'feel good' factor of 2012 through the winter, all be it different to the party atmosphere of the summer.
The retailers seemed to have captured this feeling, now it's down to us to make Christmas 2012 the finale of the year that 2012 deserves.
(It's too early to say Merry Christmas, for now anyway!)
