Households in the UK spend almost 40% of their disposable income on Christmas, according to The Christmas Barometer 2015.
According to the table, compiled by Ferratum, UK consumers spend 38.9% of their disposable income on Christmas – much higher than the 23% global average. In second place was Slovakia, with 31.4%, slightly ahead of Australia at 31.4%.
Of those asked, residents of the Netherlands planned to spend the lowest percentage of their disposable income, spending just 9.4%. Consumers in France and Norway also planned to spend less, spending 15.5% and 12.6% respectively.
Of the money spent at Christmas, consumers across all countries spend 9.6% of their budget on cosmetics and a further 3.9% on ‘well-being’. Store vouchers and gift cards were also popular, with 1.9% of the average budget spent on these.
In Slovakia, cosmetics were particularly popular at Christmas, with 23.7% of households budgets spent on these items. Similarly, they made up 19.3% in Czech Republic, 15.1% of products purchased in Lithuania and 11.4% in Romania. In Poland, beauty products made up 28.2% of the budgeted Christmas spend.
The Christmas Barometer is the result of an anonymous web survey of Ferratum’s customers. Respondents from 14,205 households across 21 countries in Europe and the Commonwealth shared how much they spend on Christmas. Respondents were aged 21-65 and had an avergae income of €805-€10,350. Disposable incomes were adjusted across each country using figures from The World Bank.
One in five households plans to spend less over the festive period than they did last year and 64% say they are planning to spend the same as last year.
Tony Gunderson, UK Country Manager at Ferratum Group, commented: “This year’s Christmas Barometer clearly demonstrates the UK’s generosity when it comes to Christmas spending, paying far more against disposable income than other countries in Europe and a majority of the commonwealth.”