Blue

While Kiwis may be enjoying the first month of the year with trips to the beach, backyard BBQs and hiking galore, most of the developed world lies in the Northern Hemisphere. For them, January brings the peak of winter and the end of the holiday season. 

In 2004, British psychologist Cliff Arnall set out to identify the saddest day of the year. Creating his own formula, he landed on what was coined “Blue Monday”: the third Monday of January. That’s when, on average, people realise the holidays are truly over, there’s another week until end-of-month payday so cash is low, the next break from work is months away and enough time has passed since the New Year’s to see their resolutions are going nowhere. People are cold, broke, and feeling blue. 

Arnall’s conclusion may sound a bit gloomy, but some stats actually support his logic. In the U.S. for example, the first month of the year has historically been one of the slowest for retail businesses. Hospitality and food services see the same drop in activities: foot traffic for bars, nightclubs, cafes and restaurants dip significantly in January, before rebounding the next month. 

Psychologists also report higher levels of depression amongst patients during the colder months. Call it the winter blues or the more official “seasonal affective disorder” – aka SAD, a rather apt acronym – it is estimated that 10-20% of Americans experience mild forms of it. Searches on Google Trends support this as well, with the term “depression” recording its highest search levels in countries of the North during January.

While it seems undeniable that January is a blue month in a huge part of the globe, some experts regard Blue Monday in particular as a myth and a PR stunt. After all, Arnall did his research for a travel company’s marketing campaign.

The real reason for the research? To reveal what drives people to plan holidays. Arnall found that we tend to do it when we feel down. And so January is both the most depressing month of the year and the month when most holidays get booked. Later research by the Travel Counselors and travel agency SuperControl reached the same conclusions.

As such, if you’re starting to feel a bit less excitable this month, or indeed during our own winter down the track, remember you’re not alone. Perhaps some holiday planning on $BKNG and $AIZ would make things better.