“Consumers will be looking for promotions this holiday season and retailers should be looking to respond by having desirable gifts for the budget-conscious consumer.”

By channel, ​online retail is expected to remain relatively flat across categories, pointing to a preference to return to physical stores. For offline retail, most holiday shoppers are extremely likely or likely to shop at mass market retailers (73%) and discount stores (56%) this year.

In the midst of a forecasted increase in consumer spending, the top three concerns for holiday shoppers this season are inflation (85%), stockouts (63%) and shipping delays (57%). Of those concerned about inflation, 37% said they would be buying fewer gifts per person, while 34% were planning to purchase less expensive items.

By category, retail gift cards (52%) and apparel (55%) are the two most popular gift categories.

The report said that ​Holiday shoppers are expected to get an early start on their shopping, with 52% starting in October or earlier, compared to last year when 61% started in October or earlier, with concerns of stockouts, or in 2020.

Moreover, most holiday shoppers plan on shopping Black Friday (60%) and approximately 50% plan on shopping Cyber Monday.

The forecast comes on the back a retail sales uptick in September of 0.3%, lifted by back-to-school shopping, following a 9.1% uptick in August.