A Spoonful of Sugar for Valentine's Day

Taxes aren't much fun but take heart (pun intended) - it's Valentine's Day! Eighty-four percent of Canadians intend to recognize a loved one today according to a study conducted for the Retail Council of Canada by POLLARA, so chances are good this will also be a day of giving and receiving.

What are you most likely to give or receive? A card. According to the survey, 66% of Canadians will purchase a Valentine's Day card(s) and will spend an average of $8.95. Next in popularity is flowers, which will be purchased by 52% of Canadians who will spend an average of $32.34.

And third? An outing to a restaurant, the choice of 48% of Canadians who will spend an average of $66.72. The Valentine's Day Across Canada survey provides many other fascinating glimpses of consumers' Valentine's buying patterns. Where are the Valentine's Day biggest spenders? Where do they buy the most stuffed animals? Or the most jewelry? It's all here.

And if you can't get enough Valentine related statistics, be sure to visit Statistic Canada's Valentine's Day by the Numbers, where you'll find nuggets such as the number of single women in Canada , what percent of the population is married, and how much the typical Canadian household spends on restaurant meals. And the spoonful of sugar? The dollar value of chocolate and candy produced in Canada in 2003 was 3.1 billion - quite a bit more than the total value of ornamental flower and plant sales in Canada in 2004 ($1.44 billion). We may say that flowers are a great gift but apparently we feel that candy is dandy, too.