Military Families Will Focus on Black Friday Shopping

Editor's note: The following is a news release provided by First Command Financial Services.

Servicemembers and their families expect to outpace the ranks of the general population in making Black Friday a centerpiece of their 2011 holiday shopping plans, according to the First Command Financial Behaviors Index.

Recent survey findings reveal that 43 percent of middle-class military families — commissioned officers and noncomissioned officers at the rank of staff sergeant and above —  are planning to do some part of their holiday shopping on the day after Thanksgiving. That’s significantly higher than the general population, where just 36 percent of shoppers have Black Friday plans.

Among those people planning to shop on Black Friday, a sizeable subset of consumers say they will make most or all of their holiday purchases on that day. The focus however, was stronger in military shoppers. They made up 37 percent of the results, when the general population made up 27 percent of the results.

“While frugal holiday shopping plans are common throughout the Middle Class, consumers in the general population do not plan to cut their spending as deeply as military shoppers,” said Scott Spiker, CEO of First Command Financial Services, Inc. “Servicemembers and their families are more likely to cut back in general, and their intention to aggressively hit the stores on the day after Thanksgiving is yet another sign of their frugal approach to spending.”

In related findings, the Index reveals that seven out of 10 middle-class shoppers plan to cut back on holiday spending this year by changing their gift-giving behaviors. Common gift-related spending strategies identified by military shoppers include:

• Spending less on gifts (44 percent)
• Giving fewer gifts per person (32 percent)
• Setting a maximum amount on gifts (31 percent)
• Giving gifts to fewer people (28 percent)
• Buying gifts from discount stores (20 percent)
• Making gifts (10 percent)