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A fabulous Festive Season

The festive season is the most important time in your gifting calendar. In December alone venues can expect to match (or exceed) sales made during the first 6 months of the year! We’ve created this resource for you filled with insights & inspirational ‘gifts’ to help plan your Festive campaign. Everything you need to wrap up Christmas and have a fabulous festive season is here.

Christmas preparation

Countdown to

Christmas Day 2023

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Spreading Festive cheer!

 

Christmas stats - 35 percent of sales

This is nearly as much as the total sales of Birthday gifts (37%). However, 97% of Christmas gifts are sold over 2 months only.

Christmas-half-annual-sales-400x400

Venues generate (on average) half of their annual gifting revenue in November and December.

Christmas stats 500K

In December many venues sell over half a million £ of gifts. How much could you sell this year?

Christmas best selling gifts

Monetary gift vouchers – where the recipient is free to choose their own experience, are extremely popular, closely followed by Spa and then Stay gifts. Dining gifts, including Afternoon Tea account for around 15% of the sales mix.

£100 monetary voucher
Spa day for 2 voucher
Stay for 2 voucher
Christmas Gift

Monetary gifts

Monetary gifts are the most popular Christmas gift for all venues.

Head massage

Spa Experiences

Spa experiences are the 2nd most popular voucher type for Christmas gifts. For venues without spa, it’s stay gifts followed by afternoon tea.

Breakfast in bed

Overnight stays

Overnight stays are the 3rd most popular voucher type, for venues with a spa.

Top tip: Create gifts with a special festive name

We’ve noticed that gifts with a Christmas twist in the name tend to perform well, helping guide people in choosing a Christmas gift. We recommend having one or two Christmas ‘highlight’ gifts – this will be useful for your gift campaigns too.

Christmas special names
Christmas recipient chart

Christmas is about family

Unsurprisingly, nearly 90% of the Christmas gifts purchased are for close family members (partners, parents, siblings or children).

 

 What gift will they be getting?

  • PARENTS are likely to receive an afternoon tea experience or monetary voucher
  • PARTNERS are the recipients that receive the most spa gifts
  • CHILDREN are likely to be given the freedom to choose their own experience, with monetary gifts being a popular choice
  • SIBLINGS are also likely to receive monetary gifts or afternoon tea experiences

Time for gifts

Leading up to Christmas, each Monday we see a jump in sales, with Saturdays being the least busy day of the week.

More than 40% of sales are placed between 10:00 and 15:00.

Plan your emails accordingly to help optimise sales!

December 2021 daily sales:

Christmas buying day chart

December 2021 hourly sales:

Last-minute gift idea?
E-vouchers!

Up until a week before Christmas, the majority of sales are sent via post, but for last-minute gifts, email delivery is an ideal alternative.

Remind your customers they can still place their orders until the very last-minute, from the comfort of their sofa!

Top tip: Last-minute men…

In December, you will have more men than usual visiting your gift shop, who tend to spend more than women. We also noticed that the closer to Christmas Day, the higher the proportion of men buying gifts.

In the week before Christmas ‘promote’ any gift vouchers you’d like to appear at the top of your gift voucher listing page, such as higher value gifts.

Christmas delivery method chart
Corporate

Who is placing the biggest orders?

Corporates! Many companies are looking for unique and memorable ways to inspire, recognise and reward people for their hard work and loyalty; to show other businesses that they truly value their relationship.

Reach out to companies, sharing a dedicated gifting page, containing a selection of your gifts they will love, and a form to allow them to pay by BACs and personalise each voucher easily. Get in touch to get it setup!

Are your teams ready for the Christmas rush?

As December is the busiest month of the year, expect customer questions and direct order requests to increase. Make sure your call centre and front of house teams (restaurants, front office, spa…) are clear on how to sell gifts.

How to process an order on behalf of a guest
How to print a voucher in house
How to send an e-voucher

Log onto the Gift App and click onto ‘How To Guides’ to view all videos.

Stationery photo by client

Stationery stock levels

To make sure we do not run out of your branded paper, wallets or envelopes, please send us more stock before the festive rush.

Here is the delivery address:

JEM Marketing & Fulfilment Services 
C/o SK Chase
FAO: Alexander Mabbott
JEM House
Little Mead Industrial Estate
Alfold Road
Cranleigh
Surrey
GU6 8ND

IMPORTANT: Each time you send some stock, please include a delivery note confirming your name, your venue name, your contact details and the quantity sent.
Please also confirm what website the stationery is for if you have multiple shops.

Successful Christmas campaign check list

Attracting visitors to your gift shop is key and is of course, vital to generating sales. Here are our top tips to do so.

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Feature ‘gifts’ in prominent places on your own website

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Have a ‘buy as a gift’ call to action & as a pop up window

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Frequent emails, social media posts & ads

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Add a gift section in all emails, including transactional emails

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Get all our tips on our Christmas checklist.… 

Christmas Checklist
christmas-campaign-examples-cropped

Stand out from the crowd

Capturing the attention of an audience is one of the toughest jobs in marketing (the average person is now estimated to encounter between 6,000 to 10,000 ads every single day!), so wowing customers with your Festive campaign is crucial.

Your gift shop ready to inspire

 

First impressions matter and your gift shop deserves special attention to compete and inspire visitors throughout the busiest time of the year. It’s your ‘shop window’, where you can draw people in and engage them with your images & copy, whilst showcasing the gift experiences that would make wonderful festive gifts.

 

  • Add Christmas images and copy to the carousel
  • Regroup your best selling Christmas gifts under one menu filter
  • Create special gifts
  • Ensure your prices are updated to the rates you’d like to receive next year.

 

You’re able to do these yourself in the Gift App, provided you have site editor permissions (if you don’t have these, but would like them, just let us know) – this lets you turn your ideas into reality and see your edits in real time. Alternatively, please click onto the buttons below.

Set it up now, you can schedule the activation date to a later date.

Training Guides

 

All you need to know about the Gift App from creating a new gift to uploading new images or processing a complimentary order.

Log onto the Gift App and click onto the ‘How To Guides’ button.

Help!

 

If you need help, please contact us:
enquiries@skchase.com