Is Good Friday the new Black Friday? Get your business ready for a digital Easter this year!

As the country continues to social distance, Easter celebrations will be forced to go online this year. Whilst this years spending predictions have not been released, we're expecting to see a similar boost but online, as overall online shopping is up 88% compared to the beginning of the year.


Indeed, the Gift Card & Voucher Association reported that the outbreak has contributed to a significant shift in how consumers give and receive gifts across the UK. We're seeing more people shop online and opt for gifts that have minimal contact and can be enjoyed at a later date.

Who usually spends the most at Easter?

Those who celebrate Easter were expected to spend £30.41 on average last year, according to comparison site Finder's survey of Easter spending in 2019. This was a 24% increase from 2018 (£24.41). The number who planned to spend at Easter also increased in 2019 to 69% from 59% the year before. A mere 9% planned to celebrate Easter without spending additional money.

When we look at age groups, there are differences. 18-24 year olds were expected to be the most cautious of their Easter sending in 2019 with projections that they would spend on average £25.28. 45-54 year olds were forecasted to have the highest spend at £32.25 on average.

Geographically, we also see differences in spending. Those in the north east of England were planning to spend £44.97 on average in 2019, compared to the West Midlands who were expecting the spend the least at £25.57 on average.

Will we see similar results this year? Time will tell.

Easter will be online this year

With UK consumers being told only to leave the house to buy essential goods, Easter will take place online this year. Already, retailers are encouraging customers to buy their Easter eggs and gifts from their e-commerce stores. Indeed, Hotel Chocolat, John Lewis and Amazon are already running low on eggs, and if you try to buy an Easter egg from Ocado you're faced with a page of out of stock items.


We're sure we'll also see many retailers across all industries posting Easter discounts this weekend to encourage shopping.

We'll also likely see many fashion retailers launch their spring sales as Easter weekend usually marks the start of people updating this wardrobes for summer. Whilst people are unlikely to rush to do this this year, retailers will still want to reduce winter stock to make room for new summer collections that were planned prior to coronavirus.

In addition, we'll likely see continued increases the sales of DIY, home and gardening goods as people plan to use the four-day weekend for home improvements. We'll also likely see online alcohol sales increase as well.

Six tips for a successful Easter online

We've put together six handy tips for retailers who want to benefit from the online boom in Easter sales. They're quick to implement, so you still have time!

1. Advertise Easter explicitly on homepage. Promote your most popular Easter gifts on your homepage so that customers can easily navigate to them. Plus, those who came to your site for something else might be inspired by the ad to also purchase from the Easter edit.
2. Create an Easter email campaign with gift and entertainment inspiration. These can also be featured on social media.
3. Extend your returns period. Due to coronavirus, many people do not want to queue at the post office to return goods, so allow them to return once the crisis has calmed down. Additionally, this will relieve your logistics centre from having to handle returns so they can focus on getting goods to customers safely.
4. Build trust in delivery times. Many customers are concerned about receiving their orders on time at the moment, so communicate the last possible order date for guaranteed Easter delivery.
5. Promise contactless delivery. If your carrier supports it, let your customers know their delivery will be contactless and explain how it will work.
6. Keep customers up-to-date on order status. During the coronavirus crisis, customers are feeling particularly uncertain about whether their order will arrive on time before Easter. A good customer experience is therefore more important than ever. Make sure you keep your customer up-to-date about the status of their order. Inform them proactively via email, SMS or WhatsApp when the goods leave the warehouse, which day they will be delivered and what time if possible.