All work, no play? Nearly a quarter of consumers say they won’t buy toys or books this year
Inflationary pressures loomed large for much of 2023. We at YouGov are asking whether they will dampen all fun for consumers across markets and push them to slash their spending on toys, puzzles, games and books in the coming months.
A recent YouGov survey asked consumers across 17 international markets about products consumers expect to spend more or less on, than they normally do, owing to inflation. Zeroing in on toys, games, puzzles and books, data shows that equal proportions of consumers say they will either spend slightly less (16%) or a lot less (16%) on such items. Those looking to spend more across these products make up 9% with 7% saying they’d spend slightly more and 2% saying they’d spend a lot more.
Nearly three in ten consumers (29%) expect to maintain their usual levels of spending on these products this year.
Consumers in the UAE (23%) are the most likely across markets to say they will spend more than usual on toys, games, puzzles and books in the next 12 months. Two in ten Indians (20%) say the same. In Europe, Poles are most likely to have similar plans (12%), while Britons (4%) and Danes (4%) are the least likely, not just in this region but across all markets, to agree.
In fact, Indonesians are the most likely in Asia (38%) who plan to spend less on toys, games, puzzles and books in the next 12 months, owing to inflation. Consumers in France are the most likely across markets to spend less than the normal amount on toy, game, puzzle and book purchases (44%). Consumers in the Nordic markets – Denmark (22%) and Sweden (26%) are least likely say so.
Singaporeans are the most likely across markets to completely cut out such expenditures - two in five of them (40%) say they will not buy toys, puzzles, games and books in the next 12 months. About a quarter of Italians (26%) and Swedes (25%) have the same plans as Singaporeans for this year.
More than two in five Danes (45%) say they will stick to their usual spend when it comes to toys, games, puzzles and books in the next 12 months.
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Methodology: YouGov Surveys: Serviced provide quick survey results from nationally representative or targeted audiences in multiple markets. The data is based on surveys of adults aged 18+ years in 17 markets with sample sizes varying between 500 and 2001 for each market. All surveys were conducted online in November 2023. Data from each market uses a nationally representative sample apart from Mexico and India, which use urban representative samples, and Indonesia and Hong Kong, which use online representative samples. Learn more about YouGov Surveys: Serviced.
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