British Women Name Household Goods Least Romantic Valentine’s Gift

UK (SANEPR.com) February 19, 2009 -- Nothing says ‘I love you’ quite like a new vacuum cleaner. Not so say 40 per cent of British women who have named household goods the least romantic Valentine’s Day gifts.


And with presents ranging from dusters to ironing boards, it’s hardly surprising that a quarter of respondents (25 per cent) say their partners are unromantic, according to a survey by Buyagift, the UK’s leading online gift experience company.


The survey also found that a third of women (31 per cent) can’t remember what their partner bought them for Valentine’s Day last year, 43 per cent think Valentine’s Day gifts tend to be clichéd, whilst an astounding 9 out of 10 women think that their partners lack imagination when choosing their present.


In addition to household goods, ill-fitting underwear also proved unpopular (16 per cent) and almost 1 in 5 women (18 per cent) named petrol station flowers as the worst gift they’ve ever received.


Below is a selection of some of the least romantic gifts received by the survey’s respondents:


1.Kitchen bin


2.Box of screw drivers


3.Pack of dusters


4.Washing up gloves


5.Vacuum cleaner


6.Ironing board / iron


7.Bag of clothes pegs


8.Kettle


9.Paintbrush


10.Tea towel


11. Clay pigeon trap


12. Second hand teddy


13. Bag of lentils


14. Same card as last year


15. A wedding card


16. Open box of chocolates


17. Stolen flowers


18. An IOU


19. Fluffy dice


20. Trip to the darts


Respondents to the survey said that gift experiences rather than physical presents make the best Valentine’s Day presents (80 per cent) whilst almost 9 out of 10 respondents (86 per cent) feel that gift experiences are also more memorable.


According to Dan Mountain, Managing Director and co-founder, Buyagift; “What this survey shows is that although British men try to be romantic, we can sometimes get it so terribly wrong! Gift experiences offer a great alternative to the clichéd presents normally associated with Valentine’s Day and leave longer lasting memories as well.”


Regionally, Welsh men fared the worst with a third of women claiming their partners to be unromantic (33 per cent). The Welsh were closely followed by men from the Midlands (31 per cent), whilst the Scots came out on top with only 15 per cent of women thinking their partners are unromantic.


This survey was carried out for Buyagift, between 23-24 January 2009 amongst a nationally representative sample of 1070 women aged 16+.


About Buyagift
Founded in 2000, Buyagift is the UK’s leading online experiences company. With a turnover of more than £12 million, the company works with more than 400 suppliers to bring its customers over 2000 gifts and experiences. Listed 55th in the Sunday Times Fasttrack fastest growing companies in 2006, Buyagift is currently growing at a rate of more than 30 per cent a year. The company has more than 3000 affiliate sites and dozens of third party clients including ASDA, Tesco, Clinton Cards, play.com, cdwow.com and toysrus.co.uk. The Buyagift.co.uk website attracts more than 800,000 unique visitors per month. For more information go to www.buyagift.com.