Centre ready for the festive Man Dash

​Yorkshire men are poised to make a mad dash to the shops on Christmas Eve as they leave it to the last minute to do their Christmas shopping, according to McArthurGlen Designer Outlet York.

The firm said regional insights on male shopper habits show that Christmas Eve is traditionally seen as the day in which men do their shopping.

McArthurGlen York is predicting a surge in sales from men partaking in the annual “Man Dash”.

Hide Ad
Hide Ad

The centre said it expects fragrance, lingerie, beauty and jewellery to be the biggest sellers on the day, with premium brands such as Kurt Geiger, Ted Baker and Fossil likely to be most popular among shoppers.

Mike Thomas, ​c​entre ​m​anager at McArthurGlen Designer Outlet York​, sai​d:​ ​“​​The Christmas Eve Man Dash has become a yearly festive fixture at the centre and we all look forward to helping our last-minute visitors.​

“Fragrance, ​j​ewellery and ​l​ingerie are always gifts which do extremely well, but we do expect to see strong sales across menswear and casualwear too, with our men also buying clothing and performance-wear for loved ones.​

“We have customer service advisers on site on Christmas Eve to help out with all shopper needs, from centre navigation and store listings right through to last-minute panic gift advice.”​

Hide Ad
Hide Ad

Meadowhall shopping centre in Sheffield said it also expects to see a Man Dash.

“We expect Christmas Eve to be 75 per cent male shoppers, particularly towards the end of the day,” said a spokesperson.

According to ​Google search data, husbands and boyfriends frequently wait until the very last minute to do their festive shopping. Searches for “gift for wife”​ ​rise dramatically in December, peaking the week before Christmas.

​The Google data​ shows that some husbands are still searching for “gift for wife” on Christmas Day, whereas no wives are still searching for gifts on Christmas Day.

Hide Ad
Hide Ad

​According to research by ​VoucherCodes.co.uk, one in five men don’t buy presents until Christmas Eve and one in ten buy last-minute gifts from petrol stations.

One in ten even resort to wrapping up something they find in their home and giving it as a present.

Yorkshire Bank’s festive survey revealed that 14 per cent of the UK population will wait until December 24 to make a last-minute dash around the shops.

​The research showed that Yorkshire has the second highest ​proportion of panic buyers in the UK.

Hide Ad
Hide Ad

London has the biggest proportion (20 per cent) closely followed by Yorkshire (19 per cent) while the South West has the lowest number of last-minute shoppers with just nine per cent confessing to taking a Christmas Eve “that will do” approach.

A third of ​shoppers​ start ​thei​r festive shopping well in advance. ​

Yorkshire Bank said: “​Unsurprisingly, women are more focused on planning ahead than men with 40​ per cent​ describing themselves as organised in comparison to just 2​5 per cent​ of men.”

Related topics: