Gender Differences On Valentine’s Day
Yeah, I know, Valentine’s Day is over, get on with it, already! Indulge me one last time and file this away for next year’s Valentine’s Day sales season.
The comparison shopping engine Shopzilla released the results of a survey conducted on their behalf by Bizrate Research of 981 online buyers that shows, not surprisingly, that lonely women get more depressed than married women on Valentine’s Day. Big surprise, huh? The only thing here is that I don’t believe anyone every tried to measure it before.
Thirty-five precent of widowed women get depressed on Valentine’s Day; 25% of single women and 25% of divorced or separated women do; and only 13% of married women get depressed on Valentine’s Day.
The survey explains that Valentine’s Day depresses many women because they consider themselves more romantic than men (73% versus 64%), and that the holiday is more important to them (85%) than it is to men (73%). Nealry all women (90%) think that romance is at least moderately important on Valentine’s Day and 71% say that their expectations have been let down on the holiday. Twenty-five percent of women have been dissatisfied with their significant other’s Valentine’s Day gift.
Seventy-eight percent of women would feel comfortable buying themselves a Valentine’s Day gift if there were single compared to only 57% of men who would do so; forty percent of women say they have bought themselves a Valentine’s Day gift while only 12% of men have.
Purchasing Behavior & Gift Preferences
A Discovery Card Valentine’s Day Shopping Survey finds that men will outspend (averaging $127) women (averaging $74) on Valentine’s Day gifts. Women’s lower spending is partly explained by the fact that 40% said that coupons/rebates would play a role in their Valentine’s Day shopping decisions, compared to only 35% of men who would take bargains into consideration.
Most men (71%) planned on giving their significant other a night out on Valentine’s Day while 66% planned to give flowers. Conversely, most women (53%) planned on buying entertainment products for their men.
Sixty-two percent of both men and women hoped to receive a night out on the town from their significant other. That’s where they part ways in preferred gifts. Men want entertainment products (45%) and candy (26%) while women want flowers (55%) and jewelry (44%).
The Discovery Card survey also found:
- Most people (65%) will make their purchase a week in advance of Valentine’s Day but one in ten men will wait until February 14.
- More than a third of women (39%) planned on spending nothing on their significant others for the holiday.
- 22% of men and 15% of women planned to buy their Valentine’s Day gift online.
- 53% of both men and women said they’d use a debit or credit card to buy their Valentine’s Day gifts.
Technorati tags: valentine’s day | valentine | gifts | ecommerce | consumer behavior | consumer insights | surveys
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