It’s crunch time.
If you haven’t finished your holiday shopping, you’re not alone. This week, the coupon site RetailMeNot.com reported that 56 percent of 1,022 shoppers surveyed between Nov. 21-26 said they typically still have gifts left to purchase by “Panic Saturday,” the unofficial name for the last Saturday before Christmas.
There are plenty of reasons you might be a last-minute shopper. Maybe you plan poorly, or perhaps living paycheck to paycheck wreaks havoc on your shopping plans. You may just enjoy the adrenaline rush of waiting until the last minute to buy gifts. If that’s the case, you probably know what you’re doing, but if you’re a novice last-minute shopper, be aware that shopping in a rush can lead to mistakes that might ruin your gift-giving plans.
So if you’re facing down the calendar and have a lot of shopping left to do, avoid the following:
Overcompensating for lost time. Yes, the clock is ticking. Yes, you need to make up some retail ground. But this isn’t a game show in which the object is to fill up your shopping cart as fast as you can.
“A mistake for last-minute shoppers is overshopping,” says Cheryl Eaton, an adjunct professor of marketing at Marlboro College in Marlboro, Vermont. “We tend to overbuy out of stress to solve a problem.”
Overspending. You probably have a ballpark spending figure in mind, but if you’re short on time and want to buy great gifts, who’s thinking about a budget? In fact, according to a Capital One survey conducted Nov. 7-14 that polled 1,000 U.S. adults, consumers are mostly likely to go over their budget when faced with an incredible sale or deal that looks too good to pass up (27 percent of respondents), when they realize there’s another person they need to add to their shopping list (20 percent) and when they find a perfect but more expensive gift (19 percent). So keep your guard up if you’re in one of those situations.
Martin Lindstrom, author of “Buyology: Truth and Lies About Why We Buy,” says last-minute shoppers are prone to purchasing unnecessarily expensive items. “These days, gift buying is less about the actual gift and more about the intentions behind it,” Lindstrom says. He has a point, given this era of gift cards and easy online shopping.
“Shoppers who skimp on emotion, story and thoughtfulness when selecting gifts tend to overspend to make up the difference in ways that usually aren’t appreciated,” Lindstrom warns.
You might want to harness the power of apps to help you stay within your budget. For instance, PriceBlink and the aforementioned RetailMeNot are useful for searching for discounted merchandise, and PS Dept. and Fetch are gift-finding apps. Other apps, like Slice, will help you organize your shopping and keep track of receipts and tracking numbers.
Regifting. If you’re really in a panic, you might consider regifting an item someone gave you that you never liked and never returned. That’s a big risk. According to an online poll of 1,000 Americans taken Dec. 13-14 by online Secret Santa gift generator Elfster.com, 60 percent of respondents felt re-gifting was acceptable, but one-third admitted to recognizing when they were receiving a regift and pointing it out to the presumably humiliated giver.
Buying too many gift cards. At some point, you may have no other choice, but don’t reach for the gift card rack too soon. For starters, nobody’s going to think you spent hours considering the perfect gift only to settle on a gift card. But you can change your gift recipient’s perception with a little flourish, says Michelle Madhok.
Madhok, founder of SHEFinds.com, a fashion blog and buying guide, suggests you “make it more personal by including something to unwrap. For example, give a Netflix subscription or an iTunes gift card with a popcorn bow, candy and maybe a throw blanket for movie night.”
And bam! Your extremely unoriginal gift is suddenly thoughtful.
There’s another reason to avoid gift cards if you can. If you buy one, and especially if you buy a lot of them, you’re committing yourself to paying a nice, round number when instead, you might have found other fun or practical merchandise for a much lower price. This isn’t being cheap — it’s being responsible with your gift budget so you can buy more gifts.
Forgetting to keep receipts. If it’s really late in the game and you’re racing through the mall during the late afternoon of Christmas Eve, you probably aren’t thinking straight. But hang onto those little pieces of paper the store clerk gives you — and better yet, tell the clerk it’s a gift (as if it won’t be apparent by the crazed look on your face) so you can get a gift receipt.
“It really is the thought that counts,” says David Hagenbuch, associate professor of marketing at Messiah College in Grantham, Pennsylvania. But in the same breath, he adds that the person you’re buying a gift for will really appreciate the thought “if it’s something they can return. So get a gift receipt if possible.”
Failing to look on the bright side. If this is your first time shopping at the last minute, you’re learning valuable lessons, says Roger Beahm, executive director of the Center for Retail Innovation at the Wake Forest University School of Business in Winston-Salem, North Carolina.
“This year’s rookies are next year’s seasoned shoppers,” he says, “and that’s an opportunity to apply learning from this year’s mistakes.”
So cheer up — you’re learning something from all of this madness, so enjoy the moment. One day, you may look back fondly on your memories of searching a half hour for a parking space and getting someone’s elbow jammed in your ear as you try to make it to the cash register. Because before too long, you’ll be knee-deep in January, staring at your anemic bank account and wondering where all the time and your money went.
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