Retail Trends
Retail is continuously evolving as consumers expect a seamless blend of physical and digital experiences. Read our insights and advice for staying a step ahead.
Discover how Forrester supports customer experience and B2C marketing professionals.
Insights
Blog
Don’t Block All The Bots. They Might Be Shopping For Your Customers.
Bot and agent management is crucial for preventing attacks from unwanted bots. But in retail, blocking all agents can block shoppers too.
Blog
Predictions 2027: In Retail, Value Wins
With meaningful retail growth harder to come by in 2027, winning market share will require more than aggressive pricing or ambitious AI investments. Discover three predictions for how economic pressure, changing shopping behavior, and agentic AI will reshape retail in the year ahead.
Blog
Predictions 2027: Digital Commerce Enters Its Post-Click Era
Forrester predicts a new era of digital commerce as AI agents take on more of the buying journey. Digital leaders will need to adapt as discovery, evaluation, and purchasing increasingly happen beyond their direct control.
Blog
US Holiday Retail Forecast, 2026: E-Commerce Powers Growth
Forrester forecasts that 2026 US end-of-year holiday season retail sales will reach $1.1 trillion. Several shifts are reshaping holiday demand, shopper behavior, and retailer priorities.
Blog
Prime Big Deal Days 2026: Retailers Pull Forward Holiday Shopping
We reviewed 116 brands and retailers to see how they responded to Amazon’s October Prime Big Deal Days 2026 event. Learn more.
Blog
E-Commerce Helps Amazon And Walmart Pull Ahead In US Retail
Get key findings from Forrester’s recently published US Retail Competition Tracker, 2026, which analyzes the retail and e-commerce performance of 60 leading US retailers to identify category trends, competitive dynamics, and growth strategies.
Blog
Agentic Commerce Exposes The Missing Dimension In Product Data
As agentic commerce takes hold, traditional product attributes won’t be enough. Learn why merchants need product data that answers shoppers’ real-world questions about fit, use, and outcomes, and how to start making that shift.
Blog
Meta, Amazon, And The Real Question About Agentic Commerce
Recent media reports have highlighted Amazon’s decision to block Meta’s Muse AI agent from making purchases on its marketplace. Muse has quickly gained attention for its ability to research products, complete tasks, and shop on behalf of consumers, while Amazon appears focused on maintaining direct control of the customer relationship and checkout experience. Retailers Should […]
Blog
To Prepare For The Future Of Owned Search, Take Our ADVICE
Forrester’s ADVICE framework guides merchants to optimize content for discoverability in their owned environment — i.e., their sites and apps. Learn what to do.
Blog
Conversational Commerce Moves Closer To Mainstream Reality
Recent moves from major players in the market are embedding both commerce and conversation into more experiences — learn more.
Blog
Prime Day, June 2026: How Retailers Competed With Amazon
Learn how major retailers and brands competed with Amazon’s June 2026 Prime Day event.
Blog
Retail’s Incremental Total Experience Shift: Select Brands See Significant Improvement
Forrester assessed 41 major US retailers for our Total Experience Score to determine how well brands win and serve customers. Retailers have work to do: The average Total Experience Score across all retailers was a mere 59.1 on a 100-point scale. Still, retail did improve compared to last year, increasing a statistically significant 0.4 points […]
Blog
Consumers Aren’t Ready To Delegate Payments To AI Agents
AI agents may soon be able to shop and pay on consumers’ behalf. But today, most consumers aren’t willing to hand over the keys — trust is the real barrier. Learn more.
Blog
Digital Commerce Has Moved On — Many Retail Websites Have Not
Our new report, Death Of The Retail Website As We Know It (Agentic Commerce Transforms Retail Strategy), takes you deeper into our findings. Forrester clients: Register for our webinar on June 30 or watch the replay! Retail websites are being sidelined by something that is more conversational and better aligned to how people want […]
Blog
Agents Are In The Aisle: The 2026 NRF APAC Innovators To Watch
The 2026 National Retail Federation APAC Innovators Showcase spotlights technology companies transforming how retailers operate and how consumers shop. Learn more about these companies.
Blog
The State Of Agentic Commerce In Mid-2026
AI shopping assistants aren't buying groceries autonomously... yet. But digital leaders cannot afford to ignore digital commerce. The time is now to build your strategy.
Blog
From Walled Gardens To Working Media: The Rise Of Commerce Media
In less than a decade, retail media evolved from a monetization tactic piloted by margin-seeking mass retailers into one of advertising’s fastest-growing channels. By nearly every surface-level metric, retail media works. Marketers shifted billions of co-op funds into it, lured by the promise of closed-loop measurement and higher return on relationships with merchants. But beneath […]
Blog
Amazon Opens Its Supply Chain Empire To All — But Is It A Fit For Your Business?
Amazon’s AWS Playbook: Now Applied To Supply Chain Logistics Per ShipMatrix, in 2025, Amazon surpassed the US Postal Service, FedEx, and UPS to become the largest parcel carrier in the US by volume. Globally, it delivers an estimated 13 billion packages every year. After decades spent building one of the world’s most formidable logistics networks […]
Blog
Ensure That You’re Asking The Right Questions About Agentic Commerce
Companies thinking about agentic commerce strategy often start in the wrong place. Get anchored in the right agentic commerce questions at Forrester’s CX Forums this June.
Blog
Attend Forrester’s Agentic Commerce Workshop To Ensure That You’re Asking The Right Questions About Agentic Commerce
Are you asking the right questions about agentic commerce? Join us at Forrester’s CX Forum East (NYC) and West (San Francisco) in June for our workshop, “Catalyze Agentic Commerce — How To Move From FOMO To Focus.”
More posts