Survey reveals holiday shopping trends

By Staff -- Home Textiles Today, 2/9/2004 12:00:00 AM

NEW YORK — There was a twist to consumers' shopping patterns over the 2003 holiday season, according to a recent survey by WSL Marketing.

Although mass merchants and department stores attracted the most shoppers again during the recent season, the number of shoppers who said they went mass remained flat — but department store shoppers visited that channel more often than they did a year earlier.

Also stepping up visits were dollar store shoppers, 32 percent of whom shopped that channel more times in 2003 than they did in 2002.

As had been expected, 49 percent of Internet shoppers stepped up their online buying.

The big loser: warehouse clubs. Some 44 percent of consumers surveyed by WSL said they shopped clubs less. However, those who held the course were most often upper-income households, and they went more often.