Software developer Salesforce shared its holiday predictions for 2025, focusing on tariffs, supply chain, high cost of living and interest rates.
Those economic challenges began to set the stage months ago. Salesforce research from May, which includes survey data from about 5,500 consumers, indicated that a third of U.S. shoppers have reported buying less over the past six months. More than half are prioritizing essentials (55%) or trading down for lower-priced goods (70%). Salesforce data also indicated 0% U.S. ecommerce sales growth in Q1 2025.
In North America, 76 of the Top 2000 online retailers use Salesforce as their ecommerce platform, according to Digital Commerce 360 data. In 2024, those 76 online retailers combined for more than $136.116 billion in web sales. The Top 2000 is Digital Commerce 360’s database ranking North America’s largest online retailers by their annual ecommerce sales.
Caila Schwartz, director of consumer insights at Salesforce, said the average shopping journey has nine touchpoints before a consumer will make one purchase.
“The consumer is discovering, researching, transacting across a myriad of different channels, devices, platforms, places — whether that’s through these LLMs [large language models] now or social media, going to the store, going on an online marketplace, then going to the brand website,” she said. “There are so many different touchpoints now, and that journey is not only long, but it’s also not even owned, a lot of times, by the brand.”
She gave the example that brands often reach consumers through social media platforms, which they don’t own and therefore have less control over when it comes to user experience and data collection.
Salesforce’s 5 holiday predictions for 2025
Among the trends Salesforce noted from its research, it found that 39% of shoppers use artificial intelligence (AI) at some point in their buying journeys.
- Hyper-personalized product discovery
- AI agents will boost employee productivity
- Unified commerce will supercharge sales
- Trade uncertainty will elevate resales
- Price and quality will drive loyalty
Gen Z is the No. 1 generation that reports wanting to go to stores to shop, especially on peak days like Black Friday. Schwartz said that could seem like an outlier “because that’s not what we’ve heard about Gen Z; they are digital natives, TikTok users, TikTok buyers.”
However, Salesforce got similar consumer insights from research six months prior. That data showed that Gen Z preferred the store more than any other generation.
When it comes to using AI tools, Salesforce data shows consumers mostly prefer to access them through mobile devices, Schwartz said.
“We’ve reached a saturation point when it comes to the rate of traffic being driven by mobile devices to ecommerce websites,” Schwartz said.
Last holiday season was “the most mobile of all time,” according to data Digital Commerce 360 previously reported. Smartphones had driven 54.5% of purchases in the period, including 65% of online sales on Christmas.
“I think we’ve reached a point where we’re not going to see any more incremental mobile traffic to ecommerce sites,” she said. “We’ve hit parity there. Where there is opportunity and growth is the rate of orders coming from mobile devices. We still see growth in that metric. We’re seeing more orders transacting with mobile. That is being mainly driven by the continued investment and focus for the industry in reducing that mobile friction at checkout through the use of tools like Apple Pay, PayPal, Venmo — you name your mobile wallet.”
1. Hyper-personalized product discovery
39% of U.S. Millennial and Gen Z shoppers use AI search while they’re in physical retail stores. And 44% of U.S. shoppers trust those AI recommendations.
Additionally, 11% of Gen Z consumers in the U.S. start their shopping searches with AI chat assistants, with 9% of Millennials doing the same. Comparatively, just 5% of Gen X and 1% of Baby Boomers start their searches with AI chat assistants.
Salesforce identified three key reasons U.S. consumers are turning to AI search for product discovery, based on its May consumer survey data.
- It helps them compare prices so they can find the best deals.
- It gives the best personalized product recommendations.
- They can search using photos, videos or audio.
58% of Americans plan to use AI for gift inspiration, Salesforce data shows. The top categories they search for:
- Apparel and accessories
- Footwear
- Jewelry and watches
- Beauty
- Food and beverage
Salesforce prediction: AI and agentic AI will generate $260 billion in global online sales in the 2025 holiday shopping season. On top of that, it anticipates AI and agents to drive $1.6 trillion in global in-store sales.
2. AI agents will boost employee productivity
This year, retailers have faced labor shortages, rising returns and costs and overall pressure from a challenging overall macroeconomic environment, Salesforce said.
“We see agents as a great way to relieve some of these pressures, especially given what we know about the U.S. consumer, which is very weary of price increases and is looking for deals,” Schwartz said. “Balancing the need to keep costs at bay so that we don’t have to raise prices is definitely top of mind,” based on what she has heard from Salesforce clients.
It found that employees using AI are 64% more productive than their peers who don’t use it, and 81% experience greater job satisfaction.
Schwartz said consumers’ AI shopping journeys often start through ChatGPT, Perplexity and other third-party AI assistants rather than on retailers’ brand websites.
“That’s ultimately shaping shoppers’ expectations for how they engage with the internet,” she said.
When consumers do get to a brand’s website, merchants have to carry that experience forward “so that it feels like they’re not going back in time to a more archaic form of shopping. They are starting their journey in the LLM, in the ChatGPT, then when they move to the brand website, they’re going to have more questions. They’re going to want to engage there. That’s ultimately where we see consumer behavior moving to.”
Schwartz added that from a retailer perspective, the traffic they get from generative AI tools “is more highly qualified” than that from social media platforms or other channels “because there is already a high degree of intent.” The question then becomes how to get the right data on retailers’ websites to answer inquiries consumers ask on generative AI platforms, she said.
Salesforce prediction: A third of global retailers will leverage AI agents to drive productivity by the end of the year.
3. Unified commerce will supercharge sales
Unified commerce refers to platforms that connect ecommerce, point of sale (POS) and order management. On average, consumers connect with retailers at nine different touchpoints in a single shopping journey, Salesforce reports.
U.S. consumers made 84% of 2024 retail sales in physical stores, according to Salesforce data. This holiday season, Salesforce anticipates 75% of U.S. shoppers buying from physical stores and 81% from online marketplaces.
In addition, 37% will buy from retailers’ websites and 34% from brands’ websites. To a lesser extent, they’ll make purchases using social media platforms (23%) and delivery applications (14%).
Millennial and Gen Z shoppers are also most likely to shop in physical stores on Black Friday, Salesforce data shows. 56% of Gen Z shoppers plan to shop in-store that day, while three-quarters of them plan to shop in physical stores throughout the holiday season. Meanwhile, 55% of Millennial consumers plan to shop in store for Black Friday, as well as 43% of Gen X and 17% of Baby Boomers.
Gen Z consumers cited immediacy as their top reason to shop at brick-and-mortar stores — they don’t have to wait for deliveries. They also cited that they can discover new products as it’s easier to browse in stores, and they can touch and feel the merchandise.
Schwartz expects younger consumers going into physical stores to keep the ratio of in-store to online holiday sales “steady.”
Salesforce prediction: For every $1 that Gen Z consumers spend online, they will spend $3 more in physical stores.
4. Trade uncertainty will elevate resales
Globally, 40% of consumers are only buying essential items in an effort to counteract the impact of tariffs, Salesforce said. Its data shows that 26% of consumers globally are holding back on discretionary and splurge purchases and 22% are stocking up before prices increase. In Canada, 31% of consumers said they’re only buying products made in their home country. On the other hand, 23% said tariffs are not changing shopping habits.
In the U.S., 43% of consumers are only buying essential items. That doesn’t change much by tax bracket either, Salesforce data shows. 44% of lower-income consumers are only buying essentials, and 42% each are doing the same among middle- and higher-income consumers.
32% are stocking up ahead of price increases and 26% are holding back on discretionary purchases. Meanwhile, 23% said tariffs aren’t changing their shopping habits. Salesforce said tariffs will least affect U.S. consumers from the Baby Boomer generation.
Uncertainty also sets the stage for secondhand products to gain traction. In the U.S., Gen Z consumers are most likely to buy secondhand products. And whereas just over a fifth of consumers (21%) will seek out secondhand products due to tariffs, nearly half (47%) said they’re likely to gift a resale item in the 2025 holiday shopping season.
Among the top reasons U.S. consumers are choosing resale:
- Saving money (which 73% cited)
- Availability (33%)
- Convenience (25%)
- Sustainability and waste reduction (24%)
- Enables them to afford more expensive brands (18%)
- Better product quality (18%)
Salesforce prediction: Consumers will see a 2% reduction year over year in promotions — tied to tariffs — which includes promo codes at checkout. Salesforce also predicts $64 billion of holiday sales will come from resale.
5. Price and quality will drive loyalty
Consistent with years’ worth of Digital Commerce 360 consumer data, Salesforce found that free delivery and lower prices are the top two reasons to shop with a retailer. What surprised Salesforce was that the third most-cited reason consumers gave for shopping with a retailer was better product quality.
That hasn’t been the case in four years, according to Salesforce data. Other factors that consumers said would make them more likely to shop with a certain brand or retailer were same-day delivery (37% cited), a loyalty program (36%) and better product selection and variety (33%).
Salesforce data also indicates an 8% increase year over year in the rate of repeat U.S. buyers in Q1 2025.
Salesforce prediction: Loyal consumers will spend 20% more than newly acquired holiday shoppers.
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