95 % of traditional Christmas Parties Cancelled in the North West

A recent survey by leading outsourced communications company, Moneypenny, shows that Christmas parties and Secret Santas are off for many offices this year in the North West, owing to the current pandemic.  The survey showed that 95% of North West offices won’t be having a traditional Christmas party this year, while 20.2% said their office is planning a virtual Christmas party for staff this year, yet 17% said there won’t be any type of party, virtual or otherwise, or a Secret Santa either.  Only 5% said they would be having a normal Christmas party, while 45.6% said party plans haven’t yet been decided.  Nationally younger workers between 18-24 were the most excited about virtual Christmas parties (29%) compared with 11% across all age groups.

The trend for virtual Christmas parties is particularly strong in London where 38% said their office is planning one this year, whereas only 20% of those in the North West said there office is planning a virtual party.

The thought of a virtual Christmas party is not filling workers with joy, as only 9% of those surveyed in the North West said they are excited about the prospect.  In contrast, in the West Midlands and London a higher proportion of workers are excited about a virtual office party (24% and 19% respectively.)

Given the unique circumstances facing businesses this Christmas, the CEO of Moneypenny, Joanna Swash, therefore decided to give a special thank you to the company’s 1,000 employees this Christmas by providing a traditional turkey, ham, or nut roast, for every employee.  As a special morale boosting surprise to announce the Christmas gift this week, Joanna sent a special video message for staff in which she unveiled a turkey with all the trimmings.

Joanna commented: “We knew Christmas was going to be very different this year and with our survey showing that virtual Christmas parties are not going to be as well received as the usual office party, we decided to offer all our staff a Christmas dinner on us.  We’ve effectively been in our people’s homes with home working for most of the year and we want to say a special thank you to them and their families. Like many businesses across the UK, our employees have had to deal with a huge amount of change to work from home, with new equipment, changes to routines and new forms of communications and they’ve managed it brilliantly, while continuing to deliver a fantastic service to our clients.”

The turkeys, hams and nut roasts, will be delivered to Moneypenny’s Wrexham offices on 23 December in the Turkey Truck.  The company has a turkey and tinsel bot ready so its staff can make their choice of meat or nut roast and can choose a collection slot.