We last shared some holiday figures before Thanksgiving and appreciated all the feedback. For Christmas, we let our friends at USA Today steal our thunder, using our data in a Christmas Day feature and getting way more exposure than we would get here at our humble little blog.
But, we’re back again with some fun holiday facts about Americans and their New Year’s Eve and New Year’s Day celebrations (for those that have them). The figures below were collected between Friday December 28 and Saturday December 29 from representative samples of US residents aged 13 and older.
Overall, New Year’s traditions are less homogenous than what we found at Thanksgiving or Christmas. Here are the topline numbers we gathered:
First, we see in the chart below that New Year’s Eve is not the universal party night everyone might think. 33% of people have no plans for the big night, while 38% will be staying home with their families. That leaves 29% of Americans to ring in the New Year in style. Admittedly, we’re kicking ourselves with the “Other” responses. We didn’t think to include a specific answer for outdoor events like Times Square or others like it around the country. Let’s assume those people fall in the 7%.
When we ran the cross-tabs, two things stood out: People who host a party are very likely to be wealthy, making over $150,000 per year. Secondly, those who are most likely to be at a bar or club were the respondents between age 18 and 29 (and let’s hope that doesn’t include a bunch of people aged 18-20).
Whether at home or a party, we know that lots of people will be staring at a television when the clock strikes midnight. What will they be watching? Check out the next graph below. 67% of people will be watching something on TV when the ball drops. Of those, the largest group will be watching the Dick Clark-inspired mainstay, New Year’s Rockin’ Eve on ABC. Coming in a distant second is Fox, followed by NBC, CNN, and then MTV. 7% answered “Other” and 27% know they will be watching something but don’t know what just yet.
Next, let’s look at people’s New Year’s Day plans. Below we see that plans on New Year’s Day are even more fragmented. Only 36% of Americans have any kind of family gathering on January 1. The most common gathering will have between 5 and 10 people in attendance. Again, 7% are unsure (perhaps the same 7% who are unsure of their TV-viewing or other plans for New Year’s Eve).
Whether at a gathering or not, we know that lots of people will be staying warm in front of the television on New Year’s Day. First, we asked about the Tournament of Roses Parade. Just over 1/3rd of people are somewhat likely to watch the parade with an even 10% saying it’s very likely to be part of their day. When we looked at the cross-tabs, age was a major determining factor. Over 51% of people aged 65 and older are at least somewhat likely to watch the parade.
What about all the college bowl games? 45% of Americans are at least somewhat likely to watch football on New Year’s Day. However, the numbers among that group are pretty strong, with 26% of people saying they are very likely to watch, most of these men as expected.
Last but not least, let’s look beyond New Year’s Day (a couple weeks at least) at people’s New Year’s Resolutions:
From the graph above, we see that a whopping 60% of Americans will have some kind of resolution heading into 2013. have of those with resolutions will center theirs on either Fitness and Exercise (16% of the overall) or Food and Dietary changes. Of those with resolutions, 10% will focus on their spending or finances while an equal 10% will try to improve their relationships or personality. Organization, planning, and work or hobby-related resolutions round out the group. Again, we see the same uncanny number of 7% falling into the “Other” category. Maybe in future research, we’ll see if these are the same people we identified as “Undecideds” deep into the 2012 election.
Until then, Happy New Year everybody. Lots of big news coming from us in January. Stay tuned.
