NRF’s holiday surveys gauge consumer sentiment and shopping trends during the winter holiday season, including Thanksgiving, Black Friday, Small Business Saturday, Cyber Monday, Super Saturday and Christmas.
More than 40 percent of holiday shoppers surveyed expect to finish their holiday gift shopping by December 19, but the biggest procrastinators will still be buying gifts through Christmas Eve.
More than 165 million Americans shopped either in stores or online from Thanksgiving Day through Cyber Monday.
Episode 89 of Retail Gets Real podcast: What retailers saw between Thanksgiving and Cyber Monday and what it means for the 2018 holiday season.
Holiday podcasts
Young adults are most likely to spend more this holiday. Top gifts continue to be clothing and accessories, and Barbie and LEGO top the list of most popular toys.
Black Friday will remain the busiest day with 71 percent planning to shop.
Consumers say they will spend an average $1,007.24 during the holiday season this year, up 4.1 percent from the $967.13 last year.
Consumers are hit with a barrage of sales and marketing messages around the holidays, but how do they behave when it comes to sales and promotions?
NRF expects holiday retail sales in November and December to increase between 4.3 and 4.8 percent over 2017 for a total of $717.45 billion to $720.89 billion.
Historical highlights
Note: Data may have changed due to ongoing U.S. Census Bureau revisions. The following resources contain data that was current at the time of reporting.
2017
- 2017 Holiday slideshow
- 2017 holiday retail sales exceed NRF forecast
- Consumers and retailers win big over Thanksgiving holiday
- November survey: Young adults are spending more this holiday season
- 164 million consumers plan to shop over Thanksgiving weekend
- October consumer survey points to busy holiday season
- 2017 forecast: Holiday sales expected to grow between 3.6 and 4 percent
- December survey: Holiday shoppers rushing to meet deadline
- Retail Holiday Planning Playbook
2016
- 2016 Holiday slideshow
- December 2016 consumer survey
- Thanksgiving weekend 2016
- Cyber Monday
- November 2016 consumer survey
- Thanksgiving weekend
- October 2016 consumer survey
- 2016 forecast