Accenture research: Shopper stress could derail holiday sales with 84% ready to abandon carts

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Accenture research: Shopper stress could derail holiday sales with 84% ready to abandon carts

New research from Accenture warns that “shopper stress” could have a major impact on holiday sales, with 84% of consumers globally saying they are likely to abandon their carts entirely due to frustration and overwhelm.

 

The findings come from phase one of Accenture’s 2025 Holiday Shopping Survey, which surveyed 3,000 consumers across 10 countries in August. The study highlights the urgent need for retailers and brands to deliver more personalised, data-driven experiences that ease the decision-making process — or risk losing valuable festive spend.

Accenture New Zealand Country Managing Director, Justin Mowday (pictured above), said while the holiday season is traditionally a time of joy, the pressure of finding the “perfect” gift can quickly turn overwhelming: “For retailers, that overwhelm could harm holiday sales, with shoppers prepared to abandon their shopping basket completely. And while this is when many retailers and brands double down on advertising and promotional campaigns to win share of the festive spend, they must pay even closer attention to customer data and use the insights to lighten the decision-making workload of the holiday shopper.”

Key findings include:

• At the start of 2024, Accenture’s Consumer Pulse Survey found that just under three quarters (74%) of consumers reported walking away from purchases because they felt overwhelmed.

• With the Holiday season fast approaching, “shopper stress,” is very much still being felt and in some cases intensifying according to the first of two holiday shopping surveys Accenture is conducting. More than eight in 10 (84%) of consumers report that purchasing holiday gifts can be so overwhelming and frustrating that they abandoned their shopping carts entirely as a result. That figure rises among younger generations, with 89% Gen Z and 91% Millennials reporting they are likely to walk away from holiday gift purchases.

• Concern over not buying the perfect holiday gift is a contributing factor to “shopper stress”. Three quarters (75%) of shoppers say they are stressed about making the right decision and a similar number (73%) are worried they will regret their choice later.

• A time of year, when major advertising and promotional campaigns are launched to promote gift giving – a cornerstone of the holiday shopping experience – the survey highlights a need for retailers and brands to take a highly targeted, data-driven approach to win a share of the festive spend. This comes as 82% of shoppers feel bombarded by advertising, up from 78% in Accenture’s Consumer Pulse Survey 2024, and 77% are overwhelmed by too many options (vs 74% in 2024).

• Retailers with physical stores could stand to gain this season as 45% of consumers say they will visit a store to see and assess products firsthand when faced with too much information while holiday shopping. Roughly half (48%) seek recommendations from friends and family, whereas one in five (add percentage) plan to use conversational assistants such as ChatGPT or Claude and one third (34%) will search on social media to combat information overload.

One example of AI in action is Noli, a L’Oréal-backed, AI-powered multi-brand beauty startup. Noli is designed to cut through the noise of the beauty category by delivering personalised product recommendations based on more than one million skin data points and thousands of product formulations.

Says Noli Co-Founder & CEO Amos Susskind: “Beauty is full of choice, opinions, claims, noise, making it the perfect category for personalization and expert guidance. At Noli, we’re using AI to solve the number one pain point in beauty: helping people find the right product for them. Our goal is to bring clarity to a chaotic space, trust to a skeptical audience, and unmatched intelligence to a deeply personal experience.”