During the recent holiday season, many Americans gave and received gift cards in place of more traditional gifts. They’ve become more and more popular in recent years, and new types including online and mobile gift cards have become available. How many Americans gave gift cards over the holidays and how many have purchased different types of cards?
Gift Cards
In Ask Your Target Market’s latest survey, 58% of respondents said they’ve purchased many gift cards. 29% said they’ve purchased just one or two gift cards at some point. And just 13% said they’ve never bought a gift card for anyone.
Of those who have bought gift cards, 47% said they’ve bought them from restaurants. 44% have bought gift cards from online stores. 44% have bought them from local stores. 41% have bought them from grocery or convenience stores. 39% have bought generic gift cards such as Visa gift cards. 22% said they’ve bought gift cards from gas stations. 8% said they’ve bought them from other online businesses. 3% have bought them from travel businesses. And 12% said they have bought gift cards from other types of businesses such as movie theaters.
Gift Card Types
93% of those who have bought gift cards said they have purchased traditional, tangible gift cards. 27% said they have bought online gift cards sent to others via email or other online channels. 18% said they have bought printable gift cards. And just 4% said they have bought mobile gift cards sent via text or email.
Holiday Gifts
This holiday season, 39% of respondents said that they bought multiple gift cards for friends and family members. Another 21% said that they bought at least one gift card this holiday season. And 40% said they didn’t buy any gift cards this year.
28% of respondents said that they received multiple gift cards from friends and family members this holiday season. 29% said that they received at least one gift card this season. And 44% said they didn’t receive any gift cards from friends and family over the holidays.
You can view the complete survey results in the widget below and be sure to click “Open Full Report” to take advantage of all the chart and filter options.
Photo Credit: Apple Gift Card from Flickr
What do you want to know? If you need some consumer insights on a particular topic, let us know in the comments below and we’ll consider it for an upcoming survey post.
Results were collected on January 2 via AYTM’s online survey panel.
