Understanding Adult and Child Consumers of Christmas Custom Products

Christmas is the most emotional and commercially intense season of the year. For on‑demand printing and dropshipping founders, it is also the shortest runway you will ever have to understand your customers, design products, and ship on time. If you misread what adults and children actually value in Christmas gifts, you end up with “cute” but forgettable custom items, heavy return rates, and inventory that is impossible to reuse in January.

Having worked with print‑on‑demand brands through many peak seasons, I have seen the same pattern: the winners are the stores that understand Christmas not just as a shopping event but as a dense cluster of human needs. Those needs look different for adults and children, but both groups respond especially strongly to thoughtful personalization, emotional storytelling, and products that fit practical constraints like budget, space, and time pressure.

This article walks through what the research says about Christmas consumption and personalization, how adult and child consumers of custom products differ, and how to turn those insights into practical product and marketing decisions for your next holiday season.

The New Christmas Custom Economy

Modern Christmas is no longer just a religious event. Historical analysis from IvyPanda shows how the holiday evolved from Christian roots and German winter traditions into a largely secular, family‑centered, and highly commercial festival, with retail sales in November and December rising steadily as people spend on decorations, gifts, and special foods. Gift‑wrapping paper and mass‑produced Christmas cards were literal inventions of this commercialization, reshaping how gifts are presented and displayed.

Data from Prosper Insights & Analytics, reported by Medill at Northwestern University, underlines how central winter holidays are in the US retail calendar. About 92.8% of adults plan to celebrate a winter holiday, and roughly 85.3% celebrate Christmas, even though only about 58.6% identify as Christian. In other words, Christmas functions as a broad cultural event, not just a religious one. Average planned holiday spending per household is about $839.00, with more than half of that going to gifts for family, plus meaningful budgets for food, decorations, and greeting cards.

Statista’s analysis of US gifting behavior shows that in 2024, the average consumer expects to spend over $1,000.00 on holiday gifts for the first time, up from a long‑standing range between about $700.00 and $950.00 since 2006. Around 60% of consumers buy gifts for partners and children, and about a third openly intend to buy themselves a holiday gift. At the same time, many shoppers are actively trying to spend less per person because of inflation concerns.

Layer on top of that the longer runway of marketing pressure. Research on Belgian shoppers from academia, examining “Why buy Christmas presents in August,” describes how retailers push Christmas promotions earlier every year, increasing the volume and visibility of gift‑related media and in‑store cues. Higher exposure to these commercial signals tends to normalize them, especially for frequent shoppers, and can even make people more accepting of extended gift seasons.

For a print‑on‑demand or dropshipping brand, this context has two implications. First, you are not fighting to create consumer desire from scratch; you are competing to become the chosen vehicle for emotions and social obligations that already exist. Second, you must respect the structural pressures consumers are under—budget limits, time stress, guilt about overconsumption—if you want your custom products to be chosen over generic alternatives.

Adult Consumers: Intentional, Emotional, and Overloaded

How adults think about Christmas spending

Adults carry the cognitive and emotional load of Christmas. They plan, budget, browse, compare, and often feel judged by how well they pull the season off. AskAttest’s research with 1,000 US adults shows that roughly 92.7% celebrate Christmas, with planning heavily concentrated in November around Thanksgiving, Black Friday, and Cyber Monday. Most shoppers now use an omnichannel mix of online and in‑store shopping, with about a quarter buying exclusively online and nearly half splitting evenly between online and physical stores.

Economic pressure is real. Prosper Insights & Analytics data indicates that over half of households feel the economy is affecting their holiday spending. Many respond by shopping sales more aggressively, comparing prices online, reusing decorations, and shifting toward more practical gifts. A UK study summarized by King’s College London notes similar patterns, with budgets around £362.00 for gifts and £317.00 for festive food and drink, and a clear sense of psychological and environmental cost attached to over‑buying.

Yet adults are not purely rational calculators. They are driven by social comparison and fear of missing out. The King’s College London authors point to Social Comparison Theory and show how curated social media feeds and cinematic Christmas advertising create unrealistic standards of a “proper” Christmas. People then use consumption—more décor, more gifts, more food—to close the perceived gap between their reality and that aspirational image, even when they care deeply about sustainability.

In practice, when I sit with founders reviewing order patterns, adult shoppers often describe two simultaneous motivations: a desire to be intentional and minimalist, and a fear of being seen as stingy or joyless if they give “too little.” Your product strategy needs to speak to both.

What adults want from custom gifts

Despite the noise, the underlying adult desire is simple: gifts that feel meaningful, not just expensive. Statista and AskAttest both highlight a strong preference for practical gifts, gift cards, and flexible items. More than half of respondents in AskAttest’s US study prioritize gift cards or cash, and about half prioritize practical gifts. Handmade and experiential gifts remain niche in volume terms, but they carry outsized emotional impact.

This is where personalization and custom production shine. Research from em‑lyon business school shows that personalized gifts are perceived as more meaningful than standard items because they trigger “vicarious pride.” Recipients feel the giver’s pride in having chosen or created something special, and this boosts their own sense of being valued. The Conversation’s piece on personalized gifts reaches similar conclusions, noting that customized items—like engraved water bottles, individualized mugs, or custom calendars—evoke joy and surprise, and signal sacrifice and effort from the giver.

Importantly for sustainability and lifetime value, these studies also find that people take better care of personalized gifts. They cherish them, repair them when damaged, and postpone replacing them. A personalized reusable water bottle, for example, can both displace many single‑use bottles and serve as a daily reminder of the relationship behind it.

On the qualitative side, consumer‑focused content from independent writers shows adults gravitating toward handmade and indie businesses for Christmas gifts. Guides that spotlight Etsy‑style sellers highlight fully custom prints, ethical handmade jewelry, photo‑based memory books, bespoke pet portraits, and hand‑painted ceramics with names and patterns. The logic is consistent: adults enjoy items that are tailored to their space, style, or story, and they are willing to wait a little longer or pay a small premium for that.

From a POD merchant’s perspective, this adult profile points toward custom décor, apparel, drinkware, and paper goods that clearly embed the relationship or shared memory, rather than generic Christmas slogans.

Risks and benefits when selling to adults

Selling custom Christmas products to adults has clear advantages. Personalized gifts create stronger emotional bonds, are less likely to be thrown away quickly, and can support premium pricing. Research suggests they also align with sustainability narratives because recipients delay replacement, which reduces waste.

The downsides are equally real. Adults under economic strain are sensitive to price and wary of being manipulated. IvyPanda’s analysis of Christmas marketing emphasizes how emotional levers and covert sales tactics can push people toward unplanned purchases that do not actually make them happier. King’s College London warns that overconsumption creates regret, debt, and environmental impact. Many consumers are actively trying to resist those pressures by buying fewer, better things, or by experimenting with secondhand gifting.

You also face operational risks. Customized items take longer to fulfill and are harder to resell if a customer changes their mind. If your design tools are confusing or you push overly AI‑generated personalization without a human filter, you may trigger the broader distrust of AI that marketing case studies have documented. For example, a Journal of Hospitality Marketing and Management study cited in Christmas campaign analysis shows that overt “AI‑powered” labeling can depress purchase intention.

In practice, the brands I see winning with adults frame custom products as a way to buy fewer but more meaningful gifts, bundle personalization with strong practical value, and set clear expectations around quality, timelines, and what can or cannot be changed after ordering.

Child Consumers: Parents as Purchasers, Kids as Users

Gift rules and minimalist parents

Children rarely hold the credit cards, but they absolutely influence baskets. The more interesting question for a POD brand is how parents structure giving to kids, and where custom products can fit inside those structures.

Family blogs and financial brands increasingly talk about “gift rules”—simple formulas that limit how many gifts a child receives. Everyday‑Reading’s compilation of Christmas gift rule ideas documents patterns such as one or two gifts per child, three‑gift rules inspired by the Nativity story, and the now‑famous four‑gift rule: something they want, something they need, something to wear, and something to read. HyperJar’s guide to using the four‑gift rule shows how parents apply this framework to each child, sometimes with budget “jars” for each category.

These systems exist for practical reasons. They help parents rein in overbuying, keep the number of presents fair among siblings, and teach kids about the difference between wants and needs. HyperJar also emphasizes the role of the four‑gift rule in teaching sustainability and gratitude, because it discourages piles of quickly forgotten toys.

Gift‑rule thinking is not limited to Christmas or even to Christian families. Everyday‑Reading points out that similar structured approaches are used in other traditions, such as themed nights during Chanukah, with categories like “treat, wear, book, share.” For your product line, this means a custom Christmas item will almost always be competing for a defined slot in a parent’s mental grid: it must clearly be a “wear,” a “read,” a “need,” a special “experience,” or a shared family gift.

Experiences, traditions, and “less is more”

Parents are also rethinking what makes a “magical” Christmas for kids. A parenting guide from Momsanity speaks directly to overwhelmed parents, offering checklists of low‑cost, memory‑focused traditions instead of expensive gifts. Suggestions range from viewing light displays in pajamas, visiting Santa, and reading Christmas stories, to random acts of kindness, letters to service members, and baking cookies for neighbors.

Consumer Reports, citing Mintel’s Winter Holiday Shopping Report, notes that nearly half of people surveyed see experiential gifts as better than tangible items, with the preference particularly strong among adults aged 25 to 34. Yet only about 12% of gifts in the previous year were actually experiences. The same article warns that overloading children with too many physical gifts can reduce focus and creativity and argues for a “less is more” approach, where family traditions become a “collective memory bank” that lasts more than a lifetime.

From a behavioral standpoint, this matches what I see in customer interviews for family‑oriented stores. Parents are hungry for products that support experiences and traditions—custom storybooks, matching pajamas for Christmas movie night, personalized baking aprons for cookie day—rather than clutter for the toy box. They want an item that participates in a ritual, not just another box under the tree.

What this means for product design for kids

For child recipients, custom products work best when they are deeply embedded in the family’s value system and gift rules. A personalized picture book or reading pillow sits naturally in the “read” category. A custom hoodie, pajamas, or winter hat clearly occupies the “wear” slot. A monogrammed backpack, water bottle, or bedding set can be presented as a “need” that still feels special.

Crucially, the design must respect parental fears of overconsumption. King’s College London’s work on Christmas over‑consumption shows how even climate‑conscious adults loosen their standards during the holidays under social pressure, only to feel regret later. If your product looks like a novelty that will be outdated by next season’s cartoon trend, it is harder for thoughtful parents to justify. If it instead emphasizes durability, reuse, and a timeless design anchored in the child’s name, interests, or family traditions, it aligns with both their emotional and ethical goals.

With older children and teens, you also have emerging “junior buyers.” Everyday‑Reading and HyperJar both mention teaching teens to use the four‑gift rule and budgeting tools for their own gift‑giving. For this group, consider customizable items they can give to others—monogrammed accessories for friends, custom phone cases, or small photo gifts—so you are not only selling to them as recipients but also as novice givers learning the social rules of Christmas.

Why Personalization Hits Harder Than Generic Gifts

The psychology of personalized gifts

Multiple independent research efforts converge on the same conclusion: personalization transforms an object into an experience. The em‑lyon study on personalized gifts finds that recipients experience “vicarious pride,” mirroring the giver’s satisfaction in having crafted or customized something just for them. This sense of pride and effort is perceived even when the actual customization process is quick or relatively easy.

The Conversation’s analysis of personalized gifts emphasizes that the “best gifts” evoke joy and surprise while signaling altruism and sacrifice. Adding initials, choosing colors, or customizing scents turns mass‑produced items into unique symbols of the relationship. Even small design choices—like including the giver’s name or a sentence about why the item was personalized—can strengthen the social connection.

DIY‑oriented content from brands such as Germania Insurance points to similar dynamics from the maker’s side. Creating personalized photo albums, recipe books, monogrammed textiles, and custom décor is presented not only as cost‑effective, but as emotionally rewarding work that helps the giver express care in a concrete way.

For POD sellers, this psychology is a gift in itself. You can offer personalization as a structured, guided process that makes adult shoppers feel creative without overwhelming them. The goal is to let the buyer author the emotional meaning, while you quietly handle the production.

Personalization as a sustainability lever

Personalized gifts also show promise as a more sustainable form of consumption. The em‑lyon and Conversation pieces both report that recipients cherish customized items longer, treat them more carefully, repair them when possible, and delay replacing them. That extended product lifetime helps reduce waste and replacement frequency.

This dovetails with broader critiques of Christmas consumerism. IvyPanda argues that current consumption levels around Christmas do not make people significantly happier than in the 1950s, yet consumers feel locked into systems that demand continual buying. King’s College London documents how holiday periods amplify waste—UK household waste can rise by up to 30% during the festive period—and highlights the environmental impact of returns, packaging, and disposable decorations.

Custom print‑on‑demand can be part of the solution or part of the problem. Because you produce items only after they are ordered, you avoid the classic overstock trap of seasonal products. But if you flood your store with low‑quality, joke‑style personalization, you are still feeding the cycle of short‑lived novelty.

Founders who use personalization as a sustainability lever tend to focus on a smaller range of high‑quality blanks—sturdy drinkware, premium textiles, long‑lasting décor—and on designs that will still feel relevant in five years because they are anchored in family identity, not this year’s meme.

Matching Products to Segments: A Simple Map

To turn these insights into a practical playbook, you can think of Christmas custom products across two dimensions: who the effective buyer is (adult for adults, adult for kids, or teen buying for peers), and what primary job the product does (practical, emotional, or experiential). The matrix below summarizes common patterns.

This map is deliberately simple, but it forces you to ask two questions for every Christmas SKU you add. First, who exactly is the decision‑maker, and what pressures are they under? Second, which job are they hiring this product to do in their social world?

Marketing That Respects Today’s Christmas Shopper

Authentic storytelling and real people

Christmas advertising case studies dissected by GoViral Digital show that the most effective campaigns lean into nostalgia, family, and togetherness, using emotionally charged storytelling rather than hard selling. Brands like Coca‑Cola and John Lewis have spent years building a “Christmas prototype” in consumers’ minds, so that a red truck or a certain music cue immediately evokes warmth and belonging.

Newer campaigns from Boots and JD Sports add inclusivity and modern realism. Boots’ “The Christmas Makeover” centers Mrs. Claus and beauty influencers, acknowledging that women often shoulder most festive labor. JD Sports’ “Family” campaign broadens the idea of family to include friends and community, featuring both celebrities and real people in everyday settings.

For smaller POD and dropshipping brands, the lesson is not to mimic those budgets, but to adopt their principles. Use real customer photos featuring families in your custom products. Share stories behind your most meaningful orders. Highlight diverse households and non‑traditional ways of celebrating. In every asset, make it obvious that your brand understands real life, not just stock‑photo perfection.

Avoiding the AI trust trap

GoViral Digital also notes a cautionary tale. A recent AI‑generated Christmas execution from Coca‑Cola was widely perceived as eerie and emotionally flat compared with its classic 1995 truck ad. More broadly, a study in the Journal of Hospitality Marketing and Management found that customers are less likely to buy a product labeled as “AI‑powered” than an otherwise identical one.

This does not mean you cannot use AI internally to help with mockups or copy drafts. It does mean you should be cautious about leaning on AI aesthetics in your customer‑facing personalization tools, especially at Christmas. When the whole point of a custom gift is human warmth and connection, anything that feels robotic can quietly undermine trust.

If you provide design assistance in your store, frame it around the human outcome, not the technology. For instance, “We help you turn your family jokes into beautiful artwork” will resonate more than “AI custom design engine.”

Helping customers feel in control

Across the Medill, Statista, and AskAttest research, a consistent theme is that consumers want to feel in control of their spending and their experience. Many delay finishing shopping to chase better prices, need time to decide what to buy, or hesitate because they are unsure what recipients actually need.

You can support that need for control in several concrete ways. Offer clear, simple personalization options rather than endless menus. Communicate cut‑off dates transparently so buyers know when they must order to avoid disappointment. Provide budgeting cues—such as “build a four‑gift rule bundle” suggestions—that map directly to the mental frameworks parents already use.

In my mentoring work, the most successful Christmas stores are those whose product pages read like a conversation with a careful, slightly stressed adult shopper. They acknowledge the budget, the clutter problem, and the desire for meaning—and then show exactly how their custom product helps.

Building a Sustainable, Profitable Christmas Custom Line

Designing a Christmas catalog is not about sheer volume of SKUs; it is about concentration. Historical data from GiftsInternational shows how enormous the gift economy has become. A UK analysis from RadiumOne cited there estimated about £24.40 billion in Christmas spending, roughly 760.40 million gifts exchanged, and an average of 14.80 gifts purchased per person for around 8.30 recipients.

Given that scale, there is no shortage of competition. Your margin comes from being sharply relevant, not from trying to cover every possible niche. Printful’s breakdown of holiday bestsellers shows that a relatively small set of categories consistently performs well: decorations and ornaments, Christmas apparel and matching family pajamas, winter accessories, drinkware and kitchen goods, cozy home items, family games and puzzles, stocking stuffers, pet accessories, and digital or experience‑adjacent products.

To use these categories effectively in a print‑on‑demand or dropshipping model, consider three practical principles.

First, focus on product families that you can personalize well and market with depth. For example, you might build an entire “family experience” story around matching pajamas, a personalized mug set, and a custom puzzle featuring a family photo. This aligns with the experiential and togetherness themes highlighted by Consumer Reports and Momsanity, while also increasing average order value.

Second, design for longevity, not just this year’s theme. IvyPanda’s application of Maslow’s hierarchy to Christmas suggests that people use consumption to meet needs for belonging, esteem, and self‑actualization. Products that help families feel closer, recognized, and unique will have a longer emotional shelf life than items that simply echo a trending slogan.

Third, integrate sustainability into your proposition without moralizing. King’s College London encourages “lifecycle thinking,” asking where and how products are made, how long they last, and how they are disposed of. You can echo that mindset by highlighting durable materials, reuse (for example, ornaments or textiles that become part of yearly traditions), and the inherent waste‑reducing nature of make‑to‑order production.

Brief FAQ

Do adults and children really need different custom product strategies?

Yes, because the decision logic is different. Adults are balancing budgets, social expectations, and their own values, and research from Statista and AskAttest shows they often favor practical and flexible gifts. Children, by contrast, sit inside parental frameworks like the four‑gift rule, where each present must justify its slot. The same product—a personalized hoodie, for example—may need to be framed as a practical upgrade for adults and as a magical, story‑driven item for kids.

Are custom products compatible with more sustainable Christmas habits?

They can be, if designed and marketed thoughtfully. Studies from em‑lyon and The Conversation show that people keep personalized gifts longer and treat them more carefully, which naturally reduces waste. When you combine that with make‑to‑order production and a focus on durable, tradition‑friendly designs, your store can help shoppers choose fewer, better gifts instead of more disposable ones.

At Christmas, consumers are not just buying products; they are negotiating identity, relationships, and values under intense time and social pressure. If you build your on‑demand Christmas catalog around how adults and children actually experience the season—with personalization, authenticity, and sustainability at the core—you can create a business that survives the January hangover and earns a place in families’ traditions year after year.

References

1. https://www.kcl.ac.uk/news/christmas-over-consumption-why-we-shop-the-way-we-do-even-climate-activists
2. https://www.academia.edu/29857338/Why_buy_Christmas_presents_in_August_The_expanding_commercial_pressure_at_gift_giving_occasions_in_Belgium
3. https://spiegel.medill.northwestern.edu/winter-holidays-early-insights/
4. https://www.consumerreports.org/money/gift-giving/no-more-junk-why-experiences-make-the-best-holiday-gifts-a5551872742/
5. https://www.researchgate.net/publication/354871098_Impact_of_Motivations_to_Buy_and_Offer_Gifts_in_Consumerism_at_Christmas
6. https://www.giftsinternational.net/knowledge-hub/guide/gifts-unwrapped-the-history-of-christmas-presents?srsltid=AfmBOoq-d9mgIbBr55hfbJhpJSftfSFT08br0Nml43CfCXFtkYNfPZcz
7. https://theconversation.com/why-personalised-gifts-are-the-real-winners-during-the-holiday-season-246429
8. https://www.broadwaybasketeers.com/buying-guide/christmas-gift-buying-guide
9. https://everyday-reading.com/christmas-gift-rule-ideas/
10. https://goviraldigital.com/case-studies-how-top-brands-nailed-their-christmas-campaigns/