Thursday, April 20, 2017

Easter and Economics

Abigail Laskowski
Mr. Reuter
Economics
18 April 2017
Easter and Economics

Every holiday comes with its positive economic benefits; Valentine’s Day causes an increased flower revenue, Thanksgiving leads to more turkeys being sold, and Christmas, well, nearly all spending increases around Christmas. Easter is no different than these holidays, bringing more egg, candy, and clothing sales. It was calculated that consumers collectively spent approximately $16.4 billion on Easter-specific purchases during the holiday season in 2015, and even more in 2016 when calculations were around $17.3 billion (Tuttle).

Easter is one of the few holidays that families gather for a meal to celebrate. According to 24/7 Wall Street, 86.9% of families will spend an average of $45 on items for these meals. Along with purchasing extra food for meals, consumers also buy increased supply of eggs to follow the tradition of dying Easter eggs. Early preparation for increased egg sales cause farmers to produce about two and a half times as many eggs than their normal output (Brown). However, this increase in production can’t just happen naturally--producers increase their spending as well, expanding flock sizes or changing feed rations. These additional costs create a positive externality for businesses associated with the farmers, as the expansions will bring in extra revenue for the business.

Similar to many holidays, Easter also brings an increase in candy revenue. According to Time.com, consumers spend $2.4 billion just on candy for the holiday season; whether that’s from pre-Easter sales or post-Easter discounts is undetermined. Many companies will alter the products they supply to grab the attention of consumers, as well. Reese’s produces chocolate-peanut butter eggs, M&Ms are created in pastel colors, and Hershey makes mini chocolate eggs. These holiday favorites are a hit for consumer and contribute to the boosted sales of candy companies.
Easter isn’t all about the food, though. Clothing sales usually increase during the Easter season, too, as many consumers like having new outfits for church or other gatherings. About 50% of consumers are said to buy new clothes for Easter, according to 24/7 Wall Street. However, in recent years “Easter’s arrival did little to get people into malls to buy spring apparel” (Russell). In the graph below, a surplus is shown in both the months of March 2015 and March 2016 as the apparel specialty stores have more inventory than sales occurring. Following the assumed trend that clothing sales will increase, the graph around March 2014 shows fairly equivalent sales and inventory.






Overall, Easter, along with other holidays, play a huge role in changes occurring throughout the economy. These seasonal alterations in sales allow for companies to increase their total revenue, as well as change how much of certain products they need.


Works Cited
Brown, Eric. "4-week Easter Upswing Winding down for Egg Producer." The Fence Post. N.p., 04 Apr. 2013. Web. 15 Apr. 2017.

Ogg, Jon C. "2013 Economic Impact of Easter at $17.2 Billion, Likely Undercounted."247wallst.com. N.p., 01 Apr. 2013. Web. 15 Apr. 2017.

Russell, Judith. "Easter Did Little to Boost Apparel Retail Sales in March." Sourcing Journal. N.p., 21 Apr. 2016. Web. 15 Apr. 2017.

Tuttle, Brad. "Easter Sales: How Much We Spend on Chocolate, Candy, Peeps | Money."Time. Time, 25 Mar. 2016. Web. 15 Apr. 2017.

6 comments:

  1. It is very interesting seeing all of the comparisons of spending over each holiday. It makes sense that Easter is the second higher spending holiday behind Christmas just because it is a core religious holiday that is well known by every Christian and most non-Christians. They even call the "Christians" who only show up twice a year to church the "E and C followers". This proves that Easter will be a really big holiday especially for candy sales. It would have been interesting to see a statistic to show how many people celebrate Easter and possibly how they celebrate it. That would give us a better idea of what people are really buying more of and not just what is the highest price.

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  2. Although there are positive effects of easter and the other holidays, there are negative effects such as an increased workload for those working during the holiday seasons producing all kinds of products for the holidays. Due to an increased workload stress would happen to cause work quality to decrease

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  3. I knew that a good amount of money was spent on Easter by consumers. I was think somewhere in the $1-10 billion range, but $17.8 billion for just this one day was pretty surprising. I understand that Easter is a religious holiday and people do take great pride in their religion, but that is still a very large amount of money. I could see that number for the end-of-the-year holidays, but not Easter as much. About 87% of families spend an average of $45 on their dinner, which isn't too surprising, though. Easter is a very good day for the economy. It brings in so much money for sellers and is a very positive time of the year for many families, with climate starting to change and other factors.

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  4. It is interesting to see how much a holiday can affect sales and revenue of stores and certain kinds of products. Your post is very thorough in describing the many ways that Easter positively affects the economy, I had never realized that Easter caused an increase in clothes. Another way that Easter might help the economy or certain businesses is Easter egg hunts. If a business decides to do one, they can bring a lot of business to them by drawing so many people. Easter is a great way to boost sales of so many different products and I think your post did a great job of showing that.

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  5. Having Easter at the beginning of springtime is really fortunate as many consumers are eager to transition from heavy sweaters and boots to lighter and brighter clothing. While most people associate Easter with candy and eggs (it makes sense that these industries would see increased revenue during this time) more and more clothing companies are advertising their spring and summer wear with Easter as a major selling point as many people consider it a bit of a dressier event for family gatherings, church services etc. I thought your post did a great job of incorporating statistics within it to prove just how big of an effect Easter has on the economy.

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  6. It is interesting that holidays can have such an economic impact. For every holiday there are seasonal favorites that come every year. For Easter in particular I thought it was interesting that clothes grow in sales. This can influence many clothing companies to start bring out their new spring clothing. Easter not only focuses effects the candy and egg industry but its interesting that it also affects the clothing industry.

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