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By Nick Rigitano
NSGA Director of Insights and Analysis
With the holiday season quickly approaching, NSGA is keeping tabs on several holiday sales growth forecasts from multiple organizations. The overall sentiment from the retail holiday forecasts released as of early October is moderate growth expected for the upcoming season with the largest gains still being driven by e-commerce.
Deloitte
According to Deloitte’s annual holiday retail forecast, holiday retail sales (Nov. 2026–Jan. 2027) are likely to increase between 4.0 and 4.8 percent compared to last year. This range would represent a similar increase to last year’s holiday sales growth of 4.1 percent, which finished above last year’s forecasted range of 2.9 and 3.4 percent.
As has been the trend in recent years, e-commerce is expected to play a big role this holiday season, forecasted to grow between 7.5 and 8.4 percent.
“Disposable personal income (DPI) remains an important input to our holiday retail forecast,” said Akrur Barua, economist, Deloitte Insights. “We project DPI to grow between 4.5% to 5.2% during the holiday season, which we believe to be a strong predictor of retail and e-commerce sales.
“The continued growth in e-commerce sales is also expected to be aided by consumers’ ongoing use of digital tools to research, compare and complete purchases across all categories.”
Mastercard
Mastercard is anticipating US retail sales to grow 5.5 percent this holiday season (Nov. 1–Dec. 24), according to Mastercard SpendingPulse, which measures overall retail sales across all payment types. For reference, an increase of 5.5 percent would mark the strongest holiday growth since 2022.
As has been the norm in today’s omnichannel world, consumers are expected to shop across all channels with e-commerce forecasted to increase 11 percent and in-store sales to increase 3.6 percent, which would be the strongest physical retail growth in 4 years.
These forecasts are supported by a strong job market, which supports wage growth and rising household wealth, helping to sustain solid spending all year. Prices will also play a factor as Mastercard estimates about half the growth in spending will be caused by higher prices, a pattern seen across recent holiday seasons.
Bain & Company
Similarly, Bain & Company is forecasting healthy growth of 4.5 percent in US retail sales this holiday season (November and December only), well ahead of the 3.5 percent rise recorded in the 2025 holiday season. The forecast calls for non-store sales (e-commerce and mail order) to grow by 9 percent while in-store sales will increase by 2.5 percent.
NOTE: For updates on additional holiday retail sales forecasts as they are released, be sure to stay tuned to the weekly NSGA Scoreboard e-newsletter.
