Dive Brief:

• Of the three quarters of shoppers who aren’t ready for the holidays, almost half will wait until Christmas Eve to finish up, a 12-year high, according to a new study from America's Research Group released Monday. 

• That squares with research from last year from purchase-based data platform Cardlytics. Last-minute shoppers in 2014 were 36% of total shoppers, giving retailers a 12% increase in physical store sales, and a 27% increase in online sales the week before Christmas, according to Cardlytics. They also spent more, averaging $1,362 per person, almost $100 more than those shopping earlier, who spent an average $1,269 each.

• And retail strategy solutions company Vennli found that 67% of shoppers it surveyed report shopping for gifts throughout November and December, with 15% saying they shop “last minute,” largely hoping for price cuts. Target and, to a lesser extent Wal-Mart, are the winners, with shoppers saying they're more likely to shop at those retailers last minute than at department stores, Vennli found.

Dive Insight:

Retailers generally have positioned themselves well going into the holidays, and physical stores saw more people actually making purchases last month, according to physical-store analytics firm RetailNext.

“As we got into Thanksgiving, there was a great uptick in traffic,” RetailNext VP of retail consulting Shelley E. Kohan told Retail Dive. “That speaks to people very interested in getting out. The weather helped tremendously. Shoppers were very aware of promotions that retailers were going to roll out Thanksgiving and even beyond that.”

That shows that shoppers got a head start on Black Friday shopping the weekend before Thanksgiving. Furthermore, though, Kohan said she has found that this year retailers and brands are being more strategic and less panicked about their pricing. 

“Last year a lot of retailers were caught off guard going into Thanksgiving,” she says. “Cyber promotions started early last year and there was more panic last year. It’s measured this year, thought out and planned. There are really great discounts and deals on a few items, for example, and the rest of the items aren’t cut as deep promotionally. I think that bodes well.”

Still, the research shows that shoppers are waiting, and waiting, for more discounts to come. Kohan agrees that consumers are extremely price-savvy, and for some items will be patient enough to wait for prices to come down as December wanes.

Macy's chairman-CEO Terry Lundgren said last month that shoppers will be indeed rewarded for their patience.

"Eventually you run out of days to sell through the inventory, because December 27th comes and volume just drops off precipitously," said Lundgren. "We're going to take markdowns. Consumers are going to have a field day, because we're going to have lots of values out there. But we're going to get rid of the inventory; have to do that before Christmas."