{"id":30609,"date":"2025-11-02T23:04:08","date_gmt":"2025-11-02T23:04:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/30609\/"},"modified":"2025-11-02T23:04:08","modified_gmt":"2025-11-02T23:04:08","slug":"as-holiday-shopping-kicks-off-buy-in-sunshine-state","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/30609\/","title":{"rendered":"As holiday shopping kicks off, buy in Sunshine State"},"content":{"rendered":"<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">Now that Halloween is over, the calendar is pointing to the real holiday season, which runs through New Year\u2019s Day, and a lot of gift and festive spending is ahead as retailers remind Floridians to keep their eyes on local merchants.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">The Florida Retail Federation (<a href=\"https:\/\/frf.org\/\" data-wpel-link=\"external\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"external noopener noreferrer nofollow\">FRF<\/a>) is advising shoppers, \u201c\u2018Tis the season to shop local.\u201d The Sunshine State business advocacy group is urging holiday shoppers to focus on stores nearby rather than fixate on buying online or ordering items from outside the area.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">\u201cThere\u2019s a strong forecast for Christmas cheer this year,\u201d\u00a0said Scott Shalley, president and CEO of the FRF.\u00a0\u201cWhether you\u2019re searching for new seasonal decor or stuffing stockings, Florida\u2019s retail stores offer the options, the deals and the expertise you need to find the perfect item this holiday season.\u201d<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">The FRF\u2019s umbrella organization, the National Retail Federation (<a href=\"https:\/\/nrf.com\/\" data-wpel-link=\"external\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"external noopener noreferrer nofollow\">NRF<\/a>), <a href=\"https:\/\/nrf.com\/media-center\/press-releases\/consumers-to-spend-second-highest-amount-on-record-according-to-nrf-holiday-survey\" data-wpel-link=\"external\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"external noopener noreferrer nofollow\">surveyed<\/a> 8,247 people between Oct. 1 and Oct. 7 to compile the projected spending patterns this holiday season. Consumers say they expect to spend $890.49 per person this year on holiday goods, gifts, decorations and other seasonal items. If that holds, it would be the second-highest amount of individual spending the NRF has recorded in the 23 years it has conducted the surveys.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">Out of the participants in that survey, 50% said they\u2019ll buy gift cards, another 46% said they\u2019ll purchase clothing and accessories, 27% will buy books and other media, 23% plan to purchase personal care and beauty items, and 22% will likely buy electronics.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.floridafarmbureau.org\/\" data-wpel-link=\"external\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"external noopener noreferrer nofollow\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-412000\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/FFB-Digital-Ads-728-x-90-1.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"728\" height=\"90\"\/><\/a><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">Given those choices, Shalley said there\u2019s no reason for consumers to bypass local merchants in their own communities. The FRF has a promotion called \u201c<a href=\"https:\/\/frf.org\/find-it-in-florida\/\" data-wpel-link=\"external\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"external noopener noreferrer nofollow\">Find It In Florida<\/a>,\u201d which encourages shoppers in the state to support local businesses.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">\u201cBy shopping local, Floridians can help boost the local economy and support their community,\u201d FRF officials said in a news release.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">Other takeaways from the NRF survey include that 42% of shoppers plan to start browsing and buying holiday gifts well before Thanksgiving to avoid the stress of last-minute shopping. Another 63% said, though, that they\u2019ll wait until Thanksgiving weekend to begin shopping and 60% said they\u2019ll finalize shopping in December as Christmas approaches.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Now that Halloween is over, the calendar is pointing to the real holiday season, which runs through New&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":30610,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[1191,19804,28,30,29,19805,19806,503,13828,22057,18540,19807,19808,1189],"class_list":["post-30609","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-florida","tag-christmas","tag-find-it-in-florida","tag-florida","tag-florida-headlines","tag-florida-news","tag-florida-retail-federation","tag-frf","tag-halloween","tag-holiday-season","tag-holiday-shopping","tag-national-retail-federation","tag-nrf","tag-scott-shalley","tag-thanksgiving"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30609","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=30609"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30609\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/30610"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=30609"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=30609"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=30609"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}