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Holiday

By Meredith Schwartz -- Gifts and Dec, 11/1/2008 12:00:00 AM

Americans will spend about $133.6 billion on the holidays in 2008, according to the Packaged Facts report, Holiday Spending in the U.S.: Spending on Gifts and Charity. That doesn't just mean in December; the spending is spread across six other holiday spending occasions of the year from Valentine's Day to Halloween.

While winter holidays may be the biggest, representing about 58 percent of holiday dollars, they're not the fastest growing: Halloween and Easter are expected to experience the largest growth at an 11 percent increase each. Overall, the outlook for 2008 winter holiday sales looks lackluster: The National Retail Federation predicted that this holiday season, retail sales will rise 2.2 percent to $470.4 billion — only half the 10-year average of 4.4 percent, and the slowest growth since 2002.

When it comes to winter holiday product trends, there is more evolution than revolution: in place of edgy fashion colors augmenting the Christmas palette, the marketplace saw an increased emphasis on green, alone or as dominant over red. Otherwise holiday themes thrive on generally trend-forward products such as aprons and wineglasses. n

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