Target
is once again getting an early start on the holiday season in a bid to undercut competitors
Amazon
and
Walmart.
Target’s (ticker: TGT) fall deals, called Circle Week, will run from Oct. 1 to Oct. 7 this year. The retailer’s event starts a week before
Walmart’s
(WMT) “Holiday Kickoff” sale event, which goes from Oct. 9 to Oct. 12, and
Amazon’s
(AMZN) two-day “Prime Big Deals Day,” scheduled for Oct. 10 and 11.
Last year, Target’s “Deal Days” started Oct. 6, which at the time was one of the store’s earliest dates for holiday deals. Retailers have been gradually creeping up their deals in the past four years, as Barron’s has previously reported. In 2019, Target’s holiday deals began Nov. 8.
“You have again some of this, ‘get the consumer early’ type of an environment,” said Steve Sadove, senior advisor for
Mastercard
and former CEO and Chairman of Saks, on a call with reporters Monday.
Americans are expected to tighten their purse strings this holiday season—meaning getting a head start will be important for retailers as they vie for consumer dollars, Sadove added.
Mastercard released its annual holiday sales forecast Tuesday. The company predicts retail sales will grow by 3.7% this holiday season, which runs from Nov. 1 to Dec. 24, down from 7.6% in 2022. That is largely in line with Deloitte’s prediction for sales to grow between 3.5% and 4.6% from November to this coming January.
Also on Tuesday, Target said it was hiring nearly 100,000 seasonal workers to handle demand, roughly the same as last year. The new positions are concentrated across the company’s stores, as well as some supply chain roles.
Holiday hiring has been especially tricky for retailers in the last two years amid a tight labor market and high consumer demand. Things may be easier this time around, with consumer demand poised to slow and the labor market showing signs of cooling.
Indeed,
Macy’s
(M) said Monday it was looking for 38,000 seasonal hires this year, down from 41,000 hires in 2022 and 76,000 seasonal employees in 2021.
Write to Sabrina Escobar at [email protected]
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