It seems that, in the last 2 or 3 decades, retailers have been putting out their Christmas products earlier and earlier. In fact, most of the major retailers are now putting Christmas decorations on the shelves well before Halloween, something that many Baby Boomers have been complaining about for years.
A full 71% of Americans are either “annoyed” or “very annoyed” by Christmas items being put on store shelves before Halloween is even celebrated, according to recent data from RichRelevance.
There is 1 group however that doesn’t seem to mind nearly as much, and those are people between the ages of 18 and 29, the so-called “Millennials.” In fact, as CNBC reported, 12% of them responded by saying that they either “like” or “love” the fact that Christmas creep happens every year.
Jake Bailey, the vice president of strategy for RichRelevance, says that “this younger group of shoppers has grown up with the practice of early holiday marketing and merchandising, so they tend to be more positive/neutral and middle-aged Gen Xers who have fond memories of shopping in the mall on Black Friday.”
The trend of putting out Christmas decorations closer and closer to summer isn’t going to stop any time soon, especially when you consider that more and more people are responding to it every year and purchasing their Christmas “stuff” as early as September 30, when online payment portal PayPal says that they saw a significant uptick in spending.
Ironically, while you would think that Halloween would be devouring everything in sight, it seems that Christmas is actually the bigger monster when it comes to holidays, and rampant consumerism.
