Women spend over eight years of their lives shopping

Thinkstock
Thinkstock

Many women are raised to be shoppers. We go back-to-school shopping, hang out at the mall with our friends, go grocery shopping with our parents, and pick out cosmetics at the drugstore as soon as we're able and allowed to. Those shopping trips grow exponentially when you're independent and no longer need an adult to provide you with allowance and a ride. But how many hours have ladies clocked browsing and spending over the course of our lifetimes? Marketing research firm OnePoll.com surveyed 2,000 female shoppers to find out and, um, it's a lot.

The average woman makes 301 shopping excursions each year, spending around 400 hours buying clothing, books, food, and toiletries. They multiplied that by 63 shopping years and discovered that ladies spend 8.5 years, or 3,148 days of their lives shopping. Now, let's take a minute to remember women are the primary shoppers in each household. Picking up new socks for her kids or buying food for dinner and school lunches are hardly selfish acts or even retail therapy-they're more like errands! ''Many men seem to think women only shop when they are buying clothes for themselves," said a spokesman for OnePoll. ''But they quite often shop for the entire family and that can be incredibly hard work.'' You tell 'em!

Here's the breakdown of the amount of time we spend shopping for specific retail items each year:

  • Clothes - 30 times, total 100 hours and 48 minutes

  • Shoes - 15 times, 40 hours and 30 minutes

  • Accessories - 18 times, 29 hours and 31 minutes

  • Food - 84 times, 94 hours and 55 minutes

  • Books - 57 times, 31 hours and 21 minutes

  • Toiletries - 27 times, 17 hours and 33 minutes

  • Gifts - 19 times, 36 hours and 17 minutes

  • Window Shopping - 51 times, 48 hours and 51 minutes


Do these numbers ring true for you, or do you feel you spend less (or even more!) time hitting the shops?


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