Friday, October 11, 2013

Best times for shopping and saving on holiday gifts

If you're preparing for the holiday gift shopping season, you might want to wait, because patience seems to pay off.

Savings.com analyzed more than 1.5 million deals from 25,000 retailers and polled leading consumer and shopping experts to determine the best times to buy popular holiday gifts.

The data reveals that in addition to Black Friday and Cyber Monday, there are several other peak sale periods during which consumers should be shopping to maximize their savings.

Highlights include:
Electronics: Black Friday and Cyber Monday continue to offer deep discounts on electronics, but there will also be eye-catching deals the first two weeks of November as retailers try to entice consumers to start their holiday shopping sooner. This will be especially noticeable this year, because the calendar has six fewer days between Thanksgiving and Christmas, and retailers are expected to kick off their promotional strategies earlier than ever to make up for the lost shopping days.

Clothing and accessories: The best time to buy apparel and accessories, including shoes, jewelry and handbags, will be Cyber Monday, with all the major online retailers offering significant site-wide deals. However, the highest volume of deals will be available from Dec. 15 to 24. As the days go on, the quantity of deals will go down, but the percentage off will go up.

Food and wine: In the three days before Christmas, the best discounts will be on food and wine, both of which serve as appropriate last-minute gift options for friends, coworkers and neighbors.

Toys, games, sporting equipment: Although there are great door busters on Black Friday and Cyber Monday, there will be triple the amount of deals in this category the first week of December. For those who procrastinate, another spike will come around Dec. 20.

For more information, visit Savings.com.

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