EBay Survey Reveals Re-Gifting More Acceptable

According to the third-annual Holiday Re-Gifting Survey commissioned by eBay, the majority of Americans (more than 57 percent) say they normally receive holiday presents they don't like. The national survey, which was conducted by Survey.com in November 2006 and polled 500 respondents, found that 69 percent of Americans now believe "re-gifting" is socially acceptable, a significant increase over last year when only 49 percent felt it was acceptable to re-gift. In fact, 34 percent said they are likely to do it themselves this year, versus the reported 21 percent from last year. Of those respondents who said they plan to re-gift an unwanted present this year, 40 percent said they would sell it on eBay to help offset their holiday expenses. The survey also found that 85 percent of consumers said they have never been caught re-gifting. However, about one-third of all respondents admitted they have knowingly received a re-gifted item. Additionally, of the 55 percent of respondents who admitted to re-gifting, the recipients are most often friends (62 percent) and co-workers (42 percent). Only 5 percent of people say they have re-gifted to their grandparents, and 18 percent admitted to re-gifting to their parents. The most popular re-gifted items include knick-knacks (32 percent); bottles of wine or spirits (26 percent); DVDs, CDs or books (23 percent); bath products (22 percent) and fruitcake (17 percent).
Only 3 percent of respondents were likely to re-gift technology and electronics items, and only 5 percent said they would re-gift jewelry and handmade gifts.