The Rich Will Shop Early This Year

By Douglas A. McIntyre Updated Mar 30, 11:08AM EDT · Published Nov 24, 5:12AM EST

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The rich will shop early this year. The poor will shop late. The edge will probably go to the poor when the amount of national holiday sales is tallied at the end of the year.

Consumer Edge Research surveyed 2,600 people to decide their shopping habits. Reviewing the study, Reuters reported, “The highest income households, or those earning $150,000 or more, plan to get an early start on their shopping.” People with lower incomes and those who are unemployed will wait until closer to Christmas.

The trend is not likely to help a dismal retail sales season get any better. Some analysts predict that retail sales could drop 3% this year compared to last. The well-to-do may shop early, but that does not mean that they will not be frugal and, as a group. They may spend less than last year because of their own credit and employment concerns.

If the unemployed wait until late in the shopping cycle, they may not shop at all. Stores may have exhausted their discounts early as the most popular products sell out. People with significant income concerns may look at their wallets as the close of the year approaches and decide that they cannot spend any money at all.

Douglas A. McIntyre

About the Author Douglas A. McIntyre →

Douglas A. McIntyre is the co-founder, chief executive officer and editor in chief of 24/7 Wall St. and 24/7 Tempo. He has held these jobs since 2006.

McIntyre has written thousands of articles for 24/7 Wall St. He is an expert on corporate finance, the automotive industry, media companies and international finance. He has edited articles on national demographics, sports, personal income and travel.

His work has been quoted or mentioned in The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, Los Angeles Times, The Washington Post, NBC News, Time, The New Yorker, HuffPost USA Today, Business Insider, Yahoo, AOL, MarketWatch, The Atlantic, Bloomberg, New York Post, Chicago Tribune, Forbes, The Guardian and many other major publications. McIntyre has been a guest on CNBC, the BBC and television and radio stations across the country.

A magna cum laude graduate of Harvard College, McIntyre also was president of The Harvard Advocate. Founded in 1866, the Advocate is the oldest college publication in the United States.

TheStreet.com, Comps.com and Edgar Online are some of the public companies for which McIntyre served on the board of directors. He was a Vicinity Corporation board member when the company was sold to Microsoft in 2002. He served on the audit committees of some of these companies.

McIntyre has been the CEO of FutureSource, a provider of trading terminals and news to commodities and futures traders. He was president of Switchboard, the online phone directory company. He served as chairman and CEO of On2 Technologies, the video compression company that provided video compression software for Adobe’s Flash. Google bought On2 in 2009.