Singaporeans among most generous in Asia at Christmas: Survey

SINGAPORE — When it comes to Christmas, Singaporeans are the second most generous gift-givers in the Asia-Pacific, according to the results of a survey released today (Nov 25).

Singaporean respondents in the survey, which was conducted by shopping deal website Groupon, said that they plan to spend an average of S$478 on presents during the year end holiday season, while their Australian counterparts said they are prepared to put aside S$599 for gifts.

The 1,050 respondents from Singapore also said they that they plan to give out about 10 presents during the festive season, compared to the mean of six across all 25,070 Groupon customers from 12 countries, which include Malaysia, Hong Kong and India.

The most popular shopping category among the Singaporeans who took part in the survey for gift is beauty products with 47 per cent indicating that they would give out such products or vouchers, followed by toys (41 per cent), general store vouchers (39 per cent).

About 43 per cent of Groupon’s Singaporean customers who responded to the poll admitted that they have passed gives that they had received on to others, but they weren’t the most practical of gift-givers with the highest figures recorded in the Philippines (58 per cent) and Hong Kong (57 per cent). At the other end of the spectrum, the only 31 per cent of Japanese said that they have “re-gifted”.