New Zealanders on track for record Christmas spend

Monday, 20 December 2021

Record Christmas spending is being predicted by Worldline.

With just five days left until Christmas, payment services firm Worldline has found New Zealanders’ spending at retail shops is nearing record levels.

“While New Zealanders are no doubt enjoying more freedom of movement due to the change to Auckland’s boundary settings, the bigger influence on increased spending across the nation was clearly Christmas,” Worldline’s head of data, George Putnam said.

In 2020, a record $4.9 billion was spent through Worldline at the core retail shops in the six weeks before Christmas, including supermarkets, department stores, appliance shops, clothing outlets, toy stores and jewellers.

“Now, with just five days of pre-Christmas trading left in 2021, we are seeing spending levels are well above last year,” Putnam said.

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The fastest annual growth pre-Christmas, taken as the 37 days since November 13, was in Whanganui up 10 per cent at $51.3 million, Taranaki up 9 per cent at $93.3m and Waikato up 9 per cent at $340m.

The smallest increases were in Marlborough, Wellington, Otago, Nelson and Gisborne.

Nationwide spending through Worldline core retail merchants, excluding hospitality, over the five days since the Auckland border eased reached $549m, up 10 per cent on the same days in the previous week.

Spending through Worldline’s payment network at accommodation merchants in Bay of Plenty jumped $1.6m compared to the same five days one week earlier.

“Movement to this region is typical for this time of year but the increased accommodation spending in recent days occurred earlier this year, coinciding with the removal of the Auckland travel restrictions,” Putnam said.

The Bay of Plenty accommodation spend is expected to increase further in the next few days but is still unlikely to reach the pre-Covid levels of 2019.