As the 2026 holiday season approaches, advertisers are planning their marketing strategies amid an uncertain economy. Consumers continue to grapple with higher prices and affordability, while brands face rising operating costs and increased pressure to prove their marketing dollars are delivering measurable returns.
As advertisers prepare for a holiday season in which shoppers are likely to remain selective about where they spend, many are betting on personalized offers, loyalty programs, bundled products and AI-powered shopping experiences to earn consumer attention.
Against this backdrop, Glossy+ Research examined which commerce channels are dominating marketers’ holiday strategies. We also looked at the discounts brands and retailers are offering and the revenue expectations that are guiding their marketing decisions ahead of the critical fourth quarter.
Methodology
Glossy+ Research surveyed 90 brand and retailer professionals about their past and current use of sales channels during the holidays, their past and current holiday marketing tactics, as well as how their current holiday season discounts and holiday revenue expectations compare to last year’s. We also interviewed executives from A-Frame Brands, Mastercard and Ritual.
Here’s what we found:
Marketers express revenue optimism despite economic pressures
In Glossy+ Research’s holiday report last year, brands and retailers expressed conservative expectations for their 2025 holiday revenue. This year, however, marketers are more optimistic. The majority of survey respondents (76%) said they expect their 2026 holiday revenue to increase 1%-31% or more in comparison to their 2025 holiday revenue.
Glossy also asked respondents if they expected their 2026 holiday revenue to decrease in comparison to their 2025 holiday revenue. No respondents (0%) said they expected their holiday revenue this year to decrease by more than 11% in comparison to last year.
While survey respondents were optimistic about their holiday revenue expectations, some of the marketing executives Glossy spoke with said inflation is weighing on their minds.
“It is getting brutal out there,” said Ari Bloom, founder and CEO of brand incubator A-Frame Brands. “Costs are getting so high, and the economy is soft right now, and probably will get softer as we get into the fall. The cost issue is going to be really hard for a lot of smaller companies to absorb with heavy discounting.”
Bloom added that the political calendar may play a role in holiday spending as well. “When you’re in an election year, you’ve got a different dynamic because there’s a lot of discussion around inflation,” Bloom said. “People will have a sentiment of whether the environment is inflationary, whether things are too expensive or there’s an affordability crisis.”
Laura Brodie, chief growth officer at supplement company Ritual, said she too is concerned about consumer confidence but remains optimistic overall. “Even with the state of the economy and consumer sentiment sitting at a pretty low point in history, I’m bullish,” Brodie said. “Spending is resilient. It’s less about what happens in holiday spending growth year over year, which will probably be modest. Where the spend actually gets allocated will be interesting to see.”
Brodie said she expects consumers to spend more on experiences this holiday season. “We’re seeing a big cultural shift towards nostalgia, being intentional and spending time with family,” she said. “I anticipate people will gravitate towards gifts as experiences or things that feel personal rather than mass-purchased. That includes brands that have a distinct point of view, or are mission-driven or founder-led. Especially in health and wellness, brands that really speak to a consumer will have a strong opportunity to win.”
While survey respondents expressed optimistic revenue expectations for the 2026 holiday season, the majority of brands and retailers said they don’t have plans to offer deeper holiday discounts this year compared to last year. Eighty-one percent of brand and retailer pros said that they expect their 2026 holiday discounts to be about the same as their 2025 discounts.
Instead of offering deeper discounts, some brands and retailers are turning to other promotional strategies like bundling products or adding a gift with purchase to entice customers. A-Frame’s Bloom said that economic pressures, including higher transportation and fuel costs, present an additional challenge for the 2026 holiday season.
“This year will be more sensitive than last year because the economic situation is more difficult and prices are higher,” he said. “We’ve been talking a lot about bundling versus discounting because holiday is a time when people will buy multiples. They might buy the same gift for three different people, and they may buy it for themselves to try on top of it.”
Bloom added that offering a gift with a purchase can encourage holiday shoppers to become repeat buyers. “We recommend products, even if it’s trial sizing, that are able to be thrown in a bag,” Bloom said. “It is a really good way to get people who are buying a gift to keep something for themselves as part of the transaction. There are ways for brands to think about getting more value out to the customer.”
Ritual’s Brodie said offering perks to existing customers during the holiday season encourages brand loyalty and can temper the expense of new customer acquisition. “Offering exclusivity to existing customers and to pull people back with something that feels unique, a compelling gift with purchase or seasonal drop. … The cost of acquisition is high during the holidays, so being able to tap an existing audience can be cost-effective.”
She explained that Ritual has also partnered with other wellness brands to cross-promote products and provide a gift with purchase during the holidays. “Brands that are in similar sizes can come together and create something that feels compelling that can benefit both brands,” Brodie said. “We’ve partnered with like-minded brands like [skincare brand] Osea and swapped gift with purchases.”
Susan Grossman, evp of consumer acquisition and engagement services at Mastercard, said in an email that she expects brands to invest in rewards, exclusive access and experiences that extend beyond the holidays this year. “The more sustainable approach is to think about value more broadly. That could be a personalized offer, exclusive access, relevant recommendations, a seamless experience, or an incentive timed to the right moment,” Grossman said.
“But to do that, you need better signals and smart personalization,” she added. “When brands understand intent, they can be more precise with when, where, and how they use incentives. Instead of blanket discounting, they can create value for the consumers who need an extra nudge while continuing to build long-term loyalty with those who already have an affinity for the brand.”
Brands’ holiday marketing tactics shift in 2026
Glossy’s survey found that brands and retailers plan to adjust the marketing tactics they’ll use during the 2026 holiday season in comparison to those they used in 2025.
The biggest changes are that CTV/streaming and TV ads are gaining traction in 2026, with year-over-year increases of 22 percentage points and 20 percentage points, respectively.
Forty-five percent of survey respondents said they plan to use CTV/streaming ads this holiday season, in comparison to 23% of respondents who said the same in 2025. The 2026 uptick followed a 14 percentage point dip in usage from 2024 to 2025.
Meanwhile, marketers’ usage of TV ads remained relatively stable between 2024 and 2025, dropping by only 4 percentage points between 2024 and 2025, but grew by a whopping 20 percentage points in 2026. Thirty-three percent of brands and retailers said they plan to use TV ads this holiday season, in comparison to 13% of marketers who said the same in 2025.
“Streaming is a really valid channel to invest in during the holidays because consumption of that media spikes,” Ritual’s Brodie explained. “But participating in streaming is actually a decision for the whole year. Starting to engage just for the holiday would be a risky move, especially for a smaller brand.”
“If you have the data to back it up over the course of the year showing this is a channel that’s proven and the ROI metrics associated, it can make a lot of sense to spike it during holiday,” she added.
A-Frame Brands’ Bloom said that both streaming and TV ads can be effective for targeting specific demographic groups during the holidays. “Streaming and television is an effective audience conversion mechanism, especially with women over 30 years old,” Bloom said. “We’ve done a lot of work on daytime TV and on QVC. We see significantly bigger segments in the holiday time period from November through mid-December, and we always put attention on those times.”
Last year, brands’ and retailers’ most-used holiday marketing tactic was brand experiences, but that strategy fell to second place in 2026 behind streaming/CTV ads. Forty-one percent of marketers said they expect to use brand experiences as a marketing strategy during the 2026 holiday season in comparison to 50% of marketers who said the same in 2025 — a drop of 9 percentage points.
Brands and retailers are also divesting from using gift guides and influencer hauls/unboxing videos this holiday season. Marketers’ usage of gift guides decreased by 19 percentage points in 2026 vs. 2025, while their use of influencer hauls/unboxing videos fell by 14 percentage points this year in comparison to last year.
Although gift guides and brand experiences decreased in marketer usage for the 2026 holidays, they remain brands’ and retailers’ top-performing holiday marketing tactics over time. Thirty-one percent of marketers said gift guides have historically performed the best for their company during the holiday season, while 28% of marketers said the same of brand experiences, putting them in the No. 1 and No. 2 ranking spots, respectively.
Although some marketers are shifting away from using gift guides for the upcoming holiday season, Ritual’s Brodie said gift guides are likely to gain importance in the AI-driven search era because AI-powered search tools often rely on best of lists and curated recommendations to answer consumer queries.
“Gift guides are very interesting in the world of AEO and thinking about LLM optimization,” Brodie said. “Overall, best of lists and gift guides are a close sister to [AI search results]. Gift guides can play an important role in holiday and especially bridging LLM research and AI overviews. So, I’m bullish about gift guides.”
Although brands and retailers are leaning into CTV/streaming ads for the 2026 holidays, those marketing tactics tied in the No. 4 spot for the best-performing holiday marketing tactic over time, while pop-up shops ranked No. 3. Influencer hauls/unboxing videos was the only marketing strategy that fell in both best historic performance and marketers’ intended use during the 2026 holiday season.
A-Frame Brands’ Bloom said brands and retailers should also consider investing in catalogs for the 2026 holiday. “Catalogs have always been very successful, and they’re heavily conversion-focused,” Bloom explained. “When they’re discount-driven and when people’s attention is on buying, you can do offers that you can only get via physical paper, and it does drive people into stores.”
Brands’ focus on owned channels wavers
Glossy’s survey found that brands and retailers are less focused on using their owned physical retail stores and owned e-commerce sites during the 2026 holiday season than they were in 2025. That’s despite the fact that both sales channels grow more important to marketers during the holidays.
Less than half of survey respondents (46%) said they plan to use owned e-commerce sites this holiday season, down from 69% of respondents who said the same in 2025. Similarly, 60% survey respondents said they plan to use owned brick-and-mortar stores during the 2026 holidays, down from the 84% of respondents who said the same a year ago.
Marketers said both channels grow in importance as sales channels during the holiday season, however. Sixty-seven percent of respondents said owned physical stores grow more important during holidays and 49% of respondents said the same of owned e-commerce sites.
A-Frame Brands’ Bloom said one reason for marketers’ decreased usage of owned stores and e-commerce sites despite their importance during the holidays may be that brands feel less of a need to spend on owned spaces.
“Brands take their own channels and especially physical stores for granted,” Bloom said. “We see that repeatedly as the pendulum shifts back to controlled environments, but the reality is that wholesale channels are dying. Physical and multi-brand retail, except for mass, is going away. Very few department stores are healthy enough to survive this year, and a lot have gone out of business.”
Mastercard’s Grossman said she doesn’t think that marketers are becoming less invested in owned channels. Rather, the challenge is that consumers no longer follow a predictable path to purchase. “Today’s holiday shopper might discover a product through a creator, compare options on a retailer’s site, read reviews, receive an offer in a banking app, and ultimately purchase somewhere else entirely,” Grossman said. “The journey is increasingly fragmented and non-linear. As a result, marketers are investing less in any single channel and more in creating connected experiences across channels.”
Nevertheless, owned physical retail stores and owned e-commerce sites continue to rank as the No. 1 and No. 2 most used sales channels during the holiday season — the same spots they’ve held since 2024. Third-party brand stores and Amazon tied for the No. 3 most used sales channel during the holidays.
Overall, Amazon remains the dominant digital marketplace. Thirty-three percent of brands and retailers said their company plans to sell through Amazon during the 2026 holiday season, and 38% of marketers said Amazon grows more important to their sales during the holidays. Meanwhile, 29% of brands and retailers said their company plans to sell through other digital marketplaces, and 26% of marketers said other digital channels grow more important to their sales during the holidays.
Amazon’s dominance doesn’t necessarily mean every brand should prioritize it or other digital marketplaces during the holidays, however. Ritual’s Brodie said the right sales channel depends largely on how often customers purchase a brand’s products. “It depends almost entirely on purchase frequency. If you’re thinking about low-frequency one-time purchase, the shift toward marketplaces and retail makes a ton of sense because the digital foot traffic is there,” Brodie said. “You don’t need to pay to drive [consumers] to the destination.”
“If purchase frequency is high, the story shifts a little bit because the value of retaining that customer in an owned channel and driving the lifetime value can outweigh the cost of customer acquisition,” she added. “For one-time purchases, or categories that have search demand within marketplaces and retail channels, that shift makes a lot of sense. For brands where purchasing is at a higher frequency, capturing that within owned e-commerce or retail experiences can make a lot of sense. The cost of acquisition spikes during holidays, so it’s really about understanding that trade-off.”
This year, Glossy’s survey tracked TikTok Shop as a standalone sales channel for the first time. Results showed TikTok Shop was the most widely planned social commerce channel: 21% of respondents said their company plans to use TikTok Shop as a sales channel during the 2026 holiday season, compared with just 6% who plan to use another social commerce platform.
Despite marketers’ interest in TikTok Shop, A-Frame Brands’ Bloom cautioned that the platform can be difficult to navigate because it relies heavily on creator-led content rather than traditional brand storefronts. “TikTok Shop is going to be very content creator-heavy and it’s harder for brands to do it unless they’re really good at working with those content creators,” Bloom said. “It’s hard for brand stores to do it on their own on TikTok. It’s not set up for it, and it’s not a platform that natively works well with established brands. Creator brands, on the other hand, are going to be fantastic there.”
AI strategy moves to the center of holiday marketing
The executives Glossy spoke with for this report said they expect AI to play a central role in 2026 holiday marketing, from creative production and campaign execution to AI-powered search and shopping assistants that are reshaping how consumers discover and buy products.
Across interviews, one theme emerged: AI is no longer an experimental tool.
Ari Bloom, founder and CEO at A-Frame Brands: “We can’t ignore AI, and how it is significantly more present this year than it was a year ago and will figure into holiday marketing planning. It’s a completely new distribution and media channel. This holiday is going to be the year of AI… We are going to see more people passively shopping, meaning agents are shopping for them. … The amount of human traffic is going to get smaller, and we’re going to have to optimize our sites for bots to crawl and discover. … Physical store visits will continue to be important because it will further differentiate from the digital experience. … When people are shopping in person, they’re looking for a different kind of experience, not to replicate the online experience. But now they’ll want to replicate the AI experience, which is highly personalized and very customized. How do you do that in stores?”
Laura Brodie, chief growth officer at Ritual: “It’s important to think about the role that channels like Meta and AI creative will play as we go into holiday. This is the top spending period, which also means the need for creative velocity. It will be interesting to see who wins with high-quality creative this season versus who doesn’t deploy the new technology in the best way. I expect we’ll see a wide array of creative. It will be interesting to monitor what creative looks like in this new world.”
Susan Grossman, evp of consumer acquisition and engagement services at Mastercard: “AI is fundamentally changing how consumers discover, evaluate and buy products. During the holiday season, shoppers will increasingly rely on AI-powered assistants to narrow choices, compare options, find deals and, eventually, make purchases on their behalf. That shifts shopping from a process of searching and browsing to one of expressing intent and receiving curated recommendations.
“For marketers, that means reaching consumers earlier in the decision journey and ensuring products, offers and content can be easily surfaced, understood and recommended by both people and AI systems. The brands that win won’t necessarily be the ones with the largest marketing budget, but the ones that can make their products and offers most relevant to a consumer’s needs and preferences.
