Back-to-school shopping has gone high-tech. While pencils and new clothes are still standard, four in 10 shoppers also plan to buy some kind of electronic device as part of their back-to-school shopping this year, a new survey finds.
Leading the high-tech charge are laptops and tablets. Half of the survey's respondents said they would be purchasing a laptop while 49 percent said they would be buying a tablet. Nearly three in 10 shoppers were planning on buying a smartphone and just 10 percent are planning on buying a desktop computer.
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"The survey data shows an increased consumer appetite for tech products with more back-to-school shoppers planning to purchase electronic tablets this year compared to 2011," said Graham Jones, general manager of PriceGrabber, which conducted the research. "Tablet computers are lighter in weight and more portable, allowing students to carry them from class to class and providing back-to-school shoppers with an alternative to more expensive laptops."
Overall, 63 percent of shoppers were planning on spending up to $500 this year for back-to- school shopping. An additional 20 percent said they would be spending between $500 and $1,000 on their back-to-school shopping. A vast majority of those shoppers, 79 percent, were planning on shopping online.
"We suspect that given the large of amount of back-to-school shoppers who said they will shop online, many are planning to do so in order to comparison shop, set price alerts, find coupons, and take advantage of last-minute discounts, free shipping and price drops," Jones said. "It seems that consumers are becoming more open to exploring creative options for saving money, so it's no surprise to us that they are flocking to the Internet to utilize its ability to save shoppers time and money."
The information in this research was based on responses from 4,450 consumers.
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