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[Alistair Aitcheson]

There seems to be a lot of sales going on in the run-up to Christmas. There's the steam sales in particular, Humble Indie Bundle has been going on, and there's loads of developers and publishers (EA, Namco, Sega, and some indies too) doing sales for iOS.

Of course, I'm not complaining in any way (sales are awesome after all!) but I just wondered if anyone knows why companies are choosing this period for their sales? Also, the sales seem to be mostly digital downloads - I'd expect off-the-shelf games to go on sale after Xmas. Why the difference?

The best I can think of for iOS is that publishers are hoping to get good spots on the App Store top 50 for when new customers get their new iDevices. Other than that, I'm not really sure.

Anyone got any ideas what the strategy is behind timing sales for the run-up to Xmas?

[JoGribbs]

Most download services have gift options now. That's probably why.

[SirNiko]

Agreed with Jogr, I have plenty of games for myself but at 5 bucks I'm already contemplating sending a few of my favorites to friends that are unlikely to have ever heard of those games, let alone play them.

[speeder]

Gifting, or even downloading for your family (like if you have a Steam account for the entire family).

[Alevice]

In my country we get a, errrm, holiday bonus normally used to buy all your goddamn gifts. So people can afford to buy more crap than usual. Which translates as sales. Which translates as cash. Which translates to ggh'blauddh.

[J. R. Hill]

Cynical answer: Companies want to make money

Hopeful answer: Companies want to give you a break

[Rob Lach]

Because all these places wanted to make TigSanta a success.

[Paul Eres]

people buy more stuff near xmas than at any other time of the year, pretty much regardless of industry or product. actually i find it strange that someone would only now wonder why there are so many sales near xmas -- don't you see this every year?

[mcc]

It worked really well for Steam that one time and now everyone wants to do it?

Just guessing.

[Μarkham]

The economy still sucks, people have less money, and therefore are more unwilling to spend the money they have.  Companies then have to lower prices so that people will buy them and need to publicize it so that people know about it.

[Xion]

wha? but there have Always been holiday sales - even before the economy sucked and everyone was broke.

I always thought it was just competition. Since so many people are buying shit for the holidays you wanna make sure that you get as large a number of those people buying your thing as you can, so you lower your prices to look more appealing than your competitors (who are doing the exact same thing.) and attract people who would have been turned away by the higher price. Or something like that. Just now it's digital because what the hell, sales are a holiday tradition and you're a dick if you don't or something.

[Alistair Aitcheson]

As for there always being Xmas sales, I'm personally used to seeing big sales in January, after people have splashed out on Xmas presents. Maybe it varies from place to place, but I'm used to seeing (generally) full-price products in the run-up to Xmas, and big price reductions after. That's why I'm surprised to see these sales right now. Perhaps January sales are more to get rid of excess stock, whereas digital products can never be overstocked.

It's interesting to read people's thoughts on this. I like the idea of gifting downloads, and it'll be interesting to see if it has increased during these holiday sales. Do a lot of people gift downloads, or do people still prefer to give something physical/unwrappable?

[Widget]

Yeah, here in the UK it was always January sales until the latest recession hit. Since that began companies seem to've been trying sales all over the place just to get people through the door. I don't remember seeing christmas sales earlier than a few years ago.

[speeder]

Here for non-digital goods it is a tradition of post-xmas sales.

xmas sales got common with recession and digital market existance.

[saimo]

It's interesting to read people's thoughts on this. I like the idea of gifting downloads, and it'll be interesting to see if it has increased during these holiday sales. Do a lot of people gift downloads, or do people still prefer to give something physical/unwrappable?

I don't know if it's a general trend, but I've sold more physical copies than digital ones for gifts. Maybe the physical aspect has (still) more relevance when it comes to gifts ().