Millions Have Yet to Begin Holiday Shopping

With Christmas only a few days away, the 2006 holiday shopping season is shaping up for a nail-biting finish after the latest industry survey released Monday showed millions of shoppers haven't even started buying their gifts, reports an article on CNNmoney.com.

According to the 2006 Holiday Consumer Intentions and Actions Survey from the National Retail Federation (NRF), 23 million consumers, or 10.8 percent of shoppers, are estimated to have completely finished their holiday shopping.

But more troubling for retailers are the 33 million consumers, or 15.4 percent of shoppers, who admitted they haven't gotten cracking yet.

The trend to procrastinate doesn't bode well for merchants. The November-December shopping season fuels as much as 50 percent of sales and profits at many chains.

The National Retail Federation estimates holiday sales during November-December will grow 5 percent to $457.4 billion, slower than last year's 6.1 percent increase.

Also worrisome to merchants is that the average person has completed 53.1 percent of their shopping versus 54.6 percent at this time last year, the report said.

The saving grace, though, for retailers is the extra shopping weekend they get.

"With Christmas falling on a Monday this year, retailers have one more weekend to bring in those holiday procrastinators," NRF CEO Tracy Mullin said in a statement.

To that end, industry watchers expect this week could be huge for department stores like J.C. Penney and Kohl's. The survey said almost half of shoppers surveyed stated they would head to a department store to finish their shopping, and one-third intend to shop on the Internet and at specialty stores.

But only 39 percent of last-minute shoppers will head to discounters like Wal-Mart and Target to finish their lists, a large drop from the 70.3 percent of consumers who planned to shop at discounters earlier this holiday season.

Meanwhile, online holiday shopping is booming. During the first 38 days of the season, total online retail spending, excluding travel-related purchases, reached $15.6 billion, up 25 percent from a year earlier, according to comScore Networks.

On Monday, December 11, consumers set a single-day record of $661 million for online spending. Two days later, that record was broken as consumers spent $667 million online.

"Retailers have been aggressive this year with their online marketing efforts, targeting consumers with early-season promotions," Gian Fulgoni, chairman of comScore Networks, said in a statement.

"Now they're looking to finish off the season strong by tempting consumers to continue shopping online later, with guarantees of on-time delivery for items purchased as late as December 18," he said.