Get ready to schmooze with your boss and Alice from accounting.
A booming stock market, strong jobs market and stable economy has more companies planning to throw a holiday party this year, according to a new survey from Challenger, Gray & Christmas.
Eight in 10 companies said that they would throw a holiday party this year, with 21 percent of those planning to spend more on their party than they did last year.
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More than two-thirds of companies planned to hire caterers or event planners to handle their parties, up from 62 percent last year, and 43 percent would invite spouses or families of their workers, up from 31 percent last year.
“Company parties are a great way for employers to thank workers for a successful year,” Challenger, Gray & Christmas CEO John Challenger said in a statement. “For employees, it’s a great way to meet and interact with co-workers and managers who are not part of one’s daily routine.”
More than 60 percent of those surveyed said that they’d serve alcohol at their holiday parties this year, up from 54 percent in 2015.
While the percentage of companies planning parties this year is up from last year, it’s lower than 2014, when nearly 90 percent of companies celebrated the holidays with a party. The percentage of companies that said they never throw a holiday party has also increased, to 16 percent this year, up from just 6.5 percent in 2014.
