Exchanging a holiday gift? Science is on your side.
Gift givers aren't nearly as offended by returns as the recipient may think, SDSU marketing research shows.
You got an ugly sweater as a gift from your cousin. Will they be offended if you exchange it for something else?
Probably not, research shows.
Stella Tavallaei, a clinical scholar of marketing at San Diego State University’s Fowler College of Business, co-authored a report on “The gift exchange taboo” published by the journal Marketing Letters that reveals recipients often overestimate how offended givers feel if their gift is exchanged or returned. Similarly, they underestimate how much autonomy givers feel recipients should have over the gift.
“Across four studies, we consistently found that gift givers would not be offended if the recipient exchanged their gift for a different item,” said Tavallaei, who worked with a researcher from the John Chambers College of Business and Economics at West Virginia University.
“Recipients tend to believe that exchanging a gift is rude or ungrateful, but most givers actually want the recipient to be happy with what they end up keeping.”
In the first study, a group of participants were given an imaginary scenario in which a coffee maker was given as a birthday gift from a friend. Participants in the receiver category wanted to exchange the coffee maker for one in another color with different features. However, they indicated they were hesitant to do so out of fear of hurting their friend.
Conversely, participants assigned the role of giver overwhelmingly said they’d prefer the recipients make the exchange.
No Offense Taken
Three follow-up studies revealed recipients' hesitation to exchange a gift is strongest when it involves personal taste (such as a style or color mismatch) and weaker when it’s about usability (as with a wrong size). Recipients also indicated they were more likely to exchange a gift if a gift receipt was included, signaling the giver’s permission to do so.
While the research indicated gift givers are not necessarily hurt when their gift is exchanged, it may cause some pain for retailers.
Previous research showed gift exchanges cost retailers billions each year due to logistics, price markdown and unsellable inventory.
“When the returned gift can’t be put back on the shelf, it affects the retailer’s bottom line,” said Tavallaei. “Exchanges also carry environmental costs, since many unwanted products eventually end up in landfills.”
Tavallaei noted there are several courses of action that can be taken by retailers to manage exchanges more efficiently, such as offering optional gift receipts, creating a “quick-swap” system for same-category items, or encouraging recipients to trade up for a higher-priced replacement (with the recipient paying the difference).
The authors received no external financial support for the research, authorship, or publication of this research
