©Andrei Ureche via Canva.com
Beyond the holiday season, self-gifting is becoming more common around Valentine’s Day as well as many other times of the year.
According to CivicScience survey data, 40% of women this year were at least “somewhat likely” to purchase themselves a Valentine’s Day gift, up from 31% in 2023 and 25% in 2022. Among men, 35% indicated they may buy themselves a Valentine’s Day gift.
A Wall Street Journal article pointed to Target using "Fit for the whole fam or just you" messaging around its heart-decorated T-shirts as an example of retailers targeting the self-gifting Valentine’s Day trend.
The trend was partly due to the larger percentage of unmarried Americans, with many not seeking relationships. On a podcast, Suzanne Kapner, the WSJ’s retail reporter, said she also connected with many married women who were buying gifts for themselves for numerous reasons. She said, “Sometimes, the husband doesn't quite know their taste, and there's nothing worse than getting that piece of jewelry or other type of gift that you don't really like, but you don't want to hurt their feelings, so it sits in a drawer forever.”
Beyond big gifting days, a survey of Canadians commissioned by Rakuten further found that 75% treat themselves at least occasionally to a gift throughout the year, including 13% who self-gift frequently.
The survey’s findings align with university studies that have shown consumers are self-gifting regularly, with benefits like stress release, a sense of relaxation, an enhanced feeling of well-being, and elevated self-esteem levels.
The Rakuten study found that 27% of respondents treat themselves to a gift due to a special occasion (i.e., birthday, Christmas, or Valentine's Day), while 38% indicated they don't need a special reason to treat themselves. Most (63%) said they treat themselves “because they feel it’s important,” while 27% do so because they believe they deserve a gift for working hard and 15% do it for a pick-me-up.
Deloitte’s 2023 holiday survey found that 75% of holiday shoppers were “tempted” to self-gift to take advantage of the holiday deals. When asked about the main factors motivating self-gifting, the top responses were finding a gift that was practical/useful (51%), satisfies one's own passions or hobbies (42%), offers moments of relaxation (39%), or has long-lasting use (33%).
Deloitte said retailers that “appeal to the needs and motivations of self-gifters will be able to generate add-on sales.”
A study from Cornell University researchers found that traditional marketing verbiage emphasizing constraint or scarcity, like “one-day only sale” and “items are going fast,” may backfire when targeting often-stressed potential self-gifters. The researchers stated that marketers can instead “use language in their communications to encourage consumers to treat themselves, even when they don’t think they have the bandwidth to do so.”