Holiday online retail sales forecast to plummet to record low during inflation

Holiday online retail sales are expected to crater as inflation weary consumers pull back on spending and retailers heavily discount merchandise to entice reluctant shoppers, new data shows.

The online spending is poised to grow by a paltry 2.5% to $209.7 billion this year — its slowest rate since 2012 when Adobe, which tracks online spending at millions of retail websites, began reporting this data.

 Last year, holiday sales rose by a robust 8.6%.

“The shape of the holiday season will look different this year, with early discounting in October pulling up spend that would have occurred around Cyber Week,” Adobe Vice President Patrick Brown said in a statement. 

The forecast covers the period from Nov. 1 to the end of the year.

Many of the supply chain glitches that were prevalent during the height of the pandemic, causing shortages and long wait times for goods, have abated. But now retailers have a different problem: an over abundance of merchandise that consumers are not interested in.

As a result, discounts are expected to be “massive” this year, according to the report, especially on computers, appliances, electronics and toys.

Markdowns on computers are expected to be as high as 32% compared with 10% last year, while electronics discounts will be about 27%, up from 8% last year. Toys will see an average discount of 22%, up from 19% last year and appliances will see an average discount of 18%, up from 4%.

The actual cost of appliances this year will likely equal what shoppers paid at the beginning of 2022 for the same item because of inflation, as The Post reported.

“The promotional price might be attractive compared to what something cost earlier this year, but it’s not clear that it will cost less than it did a year ago,” John Carey, owner of Designer Appliances, which operates two upscale showrooms in New Jersey told The Post. “It might wipe out the inflation increase.”  

As in years past, the biggest discounts are expected to hit between Thanksgiving and Cyber Monday.

Black Friday sales are expected to grow 1% from a year ago to $9 billion, while Thanksgiving Day sales are expected to decline by 1% to $5.1 billion, according to Adobe.