Yelp commissioned poll by Harris Interactive to get some insight into consumers’ holiday shopping plans when it comes to local businesses. It found that 64% of Americans plan to shop at local independent retailers, and that 7 in 10 Americans age 18-34 plan to do so – more than any other age group.

Local hoppers, it found, plan to spend $258 at local businesses on average, totaling $40 billion.

“There’s a lot of opportunity for small businesses this holiday season, and these insights can help local retailers attract more shoppers,” writes Yelp’s Darnell Holloway in a blog post. “When asked what motivates them to support small businesses in their city, the majority of those likely to shop local this holiday season said they shop local to find unique gifts (67%), 55% said they like supporting the local economy, and 44% said they shop local because it’s convenient. Additionally, shoppers aren’t just looking at retail to purchase gifts this year. We found that over half of Americans (53%) plan to purchase experience-based gifts at local businesses this holiday season, such as restaurant gift certificates (34%), theater or movie tickets (18%) and salon or spa services (17%).”

Naturally, Yelp points to the findings as motivation to “drive more eyeballs to your Yelp page.” The company cites Nielsen data saying that 82% of Yelp users visit the site intending to buy a product or service and that 89% of those who do buy do so within a week.

More of Yelp’s findings are highlighted in the following infographic.

Yelp put out some results from a similar survey last year when it found that 8 in 10 Americans planned to shop local for the holidays. You can look at more results from that for comparison here.

Images via Yelp