Corona pandemic: Consumers fear that Christmas gifts will become more expensive - and they are drawing conclusions

Will the purchase of the Christmas gifts be more expensive than originally planned due to the delivery bottlenecks?

According to the survey, many people in Germany at least assume so.

According to a survey, the vast majority of people in Germany fear that the purchase of 

 this year

will be more expensive than originally planned

due to the

.

A good half (54 percent) of consumers expect prices to rise slightly, and more than a quarter (29 percent) expect prices to

significantly

, as a representative survey published on Monday by management consultancy Ernst & Young (EY) revealed.

Buying Christmas gifts in November 2021?

Around 30 percent of those surveyed stated that they wanted to bring their Christmas shopping forward due to delivery problems.

More than half (55 percent) want to do most of their

.

Another third want to get the

weeks of

.

Only one in ten respondents want to wait until shortly before the festival to buy gifts.

Read about it:

Christmas 2021: Cash and vouchers as an alternative to a gift?

Most often, however,

or

on the

table again

this year

.

Almost every second respondent (47 percent) plans, according to the survey, to save themselves the tedious search for a suitable gift in this way.

However, the popularity of

recently decreased.

A year ago, 59 percent of those surveyed wanted to give away a voucher or money, two years ago as much as 69 percent.

Groceries

and

are also popular as gifts this year

.

Also interesting:

Buying gifts in stores or online?

The importance of

for gift shopping is likely to increase again this year.

Around 30 percent of those surveyed said they preferred to do their Christmas shopping online.

For comparison: in 2020 it was only 28 percent and in the pre-Corona year 2019 only 17 percent of the respondents.

For a good third of those surveyed (35 percent), however, the traditional local retailer is the first choice when shopping for gifts this year as well.

For comparison: in the previous year it was 42 percent.

Around 35 percent of those surveyed said they had no preference and looked for gifts both online and in-store.