Dubai: The majority of UAE residents bought Valentine’s Day gifts in physical stores last year, with restaurants and hotels topping the list of purchases, according to a new report by MasterCard.
The index includes global shopper behaviour in over 200 countries and looks into credit, debit and prepaid card transactions over a three-year period between February 11 and 14 in 2013, 2014 and 2015. It also analyses the types of spending associated with Valentine’s Day around the world.
Last year, 88 per cent of people in the country made Valentine’s Day-related purchases in person, while six per cent made them online. Restaurants accounted for the majority of the transactions at 46 per cent, followed by hotels at 37 per cent, according to the MasterCard Love Index.
Jewellery purchases made up 26 per cent of the total spend despite accounting for only eight per cent of Valentine’s Day transactions, while flowers and cards accounted for less than two per cent of spending across all years analysed.
Overall consumer spending in the build-up to Valentine’s Day has increased in every region an average of 22 per cent from 2013 to 2015.
In the Middle East, consumers are more likely to spend on jewellery (which accounts for 23 per cent of transactions) than any other region, as per the report. They are also increasingly spending on travel, with 43 per cent of transactions being made on hotels.
Global spend on restaurants and hotels was at 33 per cent and 28 per cent respectively last year. Shoppers in Latin America (54 per cent) and the United States (38 per cent) saw the majority of transactions in their regions at restaurants.
Over a fifth (21 per cent) of Europeans’ transactions were made online.
