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Research Outline

Prepared for Louise D. | Delivered November 22, 2020

Gift Industry: UK and Global Statistics

Goals

To provide an overview of the UK and global gift industry, including the market size (in terms of $, number of people, and number of gifts), the historic growth, the average spend per person per year, the segmentation of the market, and the psychographic and demographic profile of a typical buyer.

Early Findings

While information about the overall gift market was readily available, information specific to the online segment was not. We tried to go through several industry reports and surveys but we were only able to find the percent of people that buy online gift during the holidays. We also did some research to determine whether that information was available for the UK and we were faced with similar challenges, suggesting that we will most likely have to triangulate the data for the UK online gift market. Please note that we assumed that the global gift retail market was synonymous with the overall gift market, working under the assumption that retailers )online or offline) are the only place that customers would buy gifts. It is also important to note that the market size for the global gift retail market was estimated using a CAGR calculator.

Global gift market overview

  • According to Technavio, the global gift retail market was worth roughly $62 billion in 2019.
  • The market is expected to grow at a CAGR of about 2%, reaching $68.45 billion by 2024.
  • According to a survey by Episerver, about 42% of shoppers purchase holiday gifts online in 2019. While this number does not represent the overall percent of people that shop for online gifts, it was the closest number we could get that was specific to gift purchasing and not purchasing in general.
  • As such, we can estimate that about $26 billion is spent on online gift purchases globally.
  • The market is segmented into souvenirs and novelty items, seasonal decorations, greeting cards, giftware, and other gifts.
  • We also found that the global personalized gifts industry has been growing in popularity and is projected to bring $25.8 billion in 2020.
  • The industry will grow at a CAGR of 7.7% by 2027, reaching $43.3 billion. 
  • In that specific segment, personal gifts are the most prominent, bringing in roughly $20 billion in revenue in 2019.
  • Another segment is festival gifting, which is estimated to have generated about $7.5 billion in 2019.
  • The personalized gift industry is also segmented into personalized photo and non-photo items, with non-photo items heavily dominating the industry.
  • Non-photo personalized items are expected to reach $27.6 billion by 2027, growing at a CAGR of 7.1%, while photo items are expected to grow at a CAGR of 8.8% between 2020 and 2027.

Average spend on gifts

  • While determining the global average spend and the total number of people that buy gifts globally is difficult, we were able to gather a few statistics about the average spend that would be helpful.
  • According to a report by Western Union, the US, the UK, Canada, and Australia all spend about $1,000 on average for holiday gift purchases, with the UK and he US spending over $1,300 while Canada and Australia spending just below $1,000 per year.
  • France, Singapore, Spain, and Germany spend roughly $500 on average, while Poland and Russia average about $350 on holiday gifts.
  • Most of the other countries globally spend about or below $100 per year on holiday gifts.