Deloitte: US holiday retail sales forecast to hit $1.7 trillion

What happened

Deloitte has forecast that US holiday retail sales will reach $1.7 trillion this season, according to a new report covered by Retail Customer Experience. The figure represents the professional services firm's projection for combined in-store and online spending across the holiday shopping period.

Beyond the headline projection, the coverage centres on Deloitte's broader read of consumer behaviour heading into the peak trading season, positioning the forecast as a signal of underlying demand strength even as retailers navigate a shifting mix of online and physical shopping.

Why it matters

Holiday forecasts like this one function as a planning anchor for retailers, informing decisions on staffing, inventory, marketing spend and channel investment months in advance. A projection of this scale suggests retailers are gearing up for another high-stakes season in which experience quality — not just price — will determine who captures share of that spending.

For experience and operations leaders, the number matters less as a standalone statistic than as a cue: with trillions in play, even small improvements in conversion, checkout friction or fulfilment reliability translate into outsized commercial impact. Forecasts of this kind typically shape how much retailers invest in customer-facing technology, staffing and service design ahead of the peak.

By the numbers

• $1.7 trillion — Deloitte's projected total for US holiday retail sales this season.

The Renascence take

Big-number holiday forecasts get treated as good news for retail almost by default. The more useful question is what they imply about where that spending will actually land — and it won't land evenly.

A trillion-dollar forecast says nothing about which retailers benefit; that's decided at the level of individual journeys, not aggregate demand. Shoppers under time pressure and choice overload during peak season default to whoever removes friction fastest — clear stock visibility, fast checkout, reliable delivery promises kept. Retailers chasing this number should treat it as a stress test of their operational and service fundamentals, not a tailwind they can bank on. The firms that actually capture a disproportionate share of that $1.7 trillion will be the ones that made shopping decisions easier, not just more available.