Shoppers make Valentine’s Day an online affair

31% of people buying a Valentine's Day gift this year intend to do so online, according to research by One Hour Translation.

The company conducted a survey in collaboration with Google Consumer Surveys, involving 4,020 people in the USA, Canada, Mexico, Italy, Germany, France, Spain, Holland, Brazil, Japan and Australia. The countries with the leading number of respondents preferring to buy presents in physical stores were Japan (35%), Italy (33%), Holland (30%) and Mexico (29%). Only 19% of respondents from the US and Canada, 13% from France and Spain and 11% in Brazil and Australia and 7% from Germany answered that they intend to purchase a Valentine’s gift from a brick and mortar store. The country with the largest number of respondents preferring to make an online purchase was Italy (23%). Holland followed with 16%, with the US and Canada (10% each) close behind.

"This is our first survey for this holiday, but it is one in a series of surveys concerning online purchases that we have been carrying out for the last few years,” says Yaron Kaufman, CMO at One Hour Translation. "Similar to the other surveys, the new Valentine's Day survey points to a large number of consumers, 31%, who prefer to buy online. The conclusion is clear; since Valentine's Day is the most significant shopping day after the November-December holidays and so many people are open to online shopping, we recommend that e-commerce companies expand their digital marketing activity around Valentine's Day and utilise the geographical, gender and age-group segments that we have presented in this survey."