In the days before online shopping, catalogs were a common way to purchase holiday gifts without having to go to a store as customers placed and received their orders directly through the mail. Sears issued the first holiday edition of its popular catalog in 1933 selling toys like a Mickey Mouse watch, a Lionel electric train set, and live singing canaries. In 1968, the catalog grew to more than 600 pages, including 225 pages of toys. Many companies relied on catalogs for direct-to-consumer marketing during the holidays, including L.L. Bean, JCPenney, Lands’ End, and Hammacher Schlemmer. 

Of course, printing and mailing hundreds of pages thick with colorful pictures and glossy paper was a big marketing expense. In the 2000s, customers started doing more holiday shopping online instead of by mail-order catalog. Stores responded by making the catalogs smaller or swapping them for cheaper, one-page mailers directing shoppers to their website. Between 2006 and 2018, the number of catalogs shipped out each year dropped by 40 percent. Like video rental stores and the telephone book, holiday catalogs appeared to be another casualty of the internet. 

But now it seems like holiday catalogs are making a comeback as retailers try to cut through the flood of advertisements consumers see in their social media feeds and email inboxes during the shopping season. In 2018, the same year that Sears went bankrupt, Amazon launched the Amazon Kids Gift Book, a print catalog. This year’s edition has more than 600 toys and gifts as well as a code to unlock a free Squishmallows character in Roblox. “Our human brains haven’t evolved as fast as technology and computers over the past 10 to 20 years,” Jonathan Zhang, a professor of marketing at Colorado State University. “The psychology shows that three-dimensional, tactile experiences are more memorable.”

Questions: 

1. How did changes in consumer behavior affect the production of holiday catalogs in the 2000s?
2. What do you think are some advantages that product catalogs have over online advertisements?

Source: David Sharp, “Why Your Favorite Catalogs Are Smaller This Holiday Season,” Associated Press, Nov. 30, 2024.