Holiday Shopping During the Pandemic?!?

As we head toward the holiday shopping season in a year that can only be described as unexpected, it only makes sense that the shopping season will bring up some unexpected considerations as well. It has been almost a decade since I penned my first holiday-shopping guide and over the years the advice has stayed pretty steady, every year I share my tried and true tricks to get you done on a budget. This year though I have four new areas that I want to highlight, this is not your average year.

Shop Early

I know you are thinking this one is just common sense and on some levels it is. This year though I plan on breaking my hard fast rule of waiting for the Post-Thanksgiving sales to start my shopping. This year factors such as poor retail sales and lack of inventory will lead retailers to start the deals earlier, and if you wait you will simply miss out on the best pricing. The competition will be fierce for your money this year and the good sales will start rolling out in October and carry through the entire holiday season. This year will most likely be a record-breaker year for online shopping, and while that is the safer option, already stressed supply chains are going to be pushed to the limit trying to meet demand. By planning and shopping early hopefully you can avoid some of the stress of wondering if everything will arrive on time.

Stick to the Budget

For some of you, this includes making a budget for the first time as well. There are multiple reasons why I suggest this every year, but this year there are new factors at play. Even if you weathered the shutdowns without losing income, we are all facing uncertainty to some extent and it just does not make sense to play loose and free with your money right now. Even if you are confident in your financial position, this year there will be unusual expenses for most of us versus a normal holiday season. With gathering restrictions I expect that we will see smaller family meals and more gifts being shipped to extended family members. This means that you need to budget for higher food expenses if you usually do not host holiday meals at your home. This also means in many cases if you cannot take advantage of direct shipping from the retailer of your gifts, you will need to budget for packing and shipping.

Shipping Timing

I have already touched on this a bit, but this is going to be a huge factor this year. Not only do you need to worry about your items arriving to you on time, but you also need to worry about them getting to the recipient on time. This is worrisome as we are already experiencing delays. While I strongly recommend using gift shopping options when shopping online and letting your gifts go directly to the recipients, I understand that if you make in-store purchases or shop extremely early that is not practical. If you are going to be shipping I strongly suggest that you are doing shopping and have the items shipped at least 2.5 weeks out from the desired arrival date. This may be extreme, but I would error on the side of caution with this one.

Rethink Your Lists

Like it or not the pandemic has changed the way we live, and many of those changes are here to stay at least for the short term. Expect items that you would not normally consider “hot items” to sell out, things like board games and outdoor play toys, and plan accordingly if they are on your list. Experience gifts will be another category that will see a shift, things like streaming subscriptions, and monthly subscription boxes will see an increase in demand. If you are brave enough to gamble on their useability I expect we will see deep discounts on season passes to theme parks and the like, perhaps even some buy one year get one free like we saw this summer. Of course last but not least athleisure will be a huge category this year with remote work and learning ongoing.

We are all trying to navigate this new world and this holiday season will be a new experience for both shoppers and retailers. I hope that these tips will help you better navigate these uncharted waters and more importantly stay safe and enjoy this holiday season!