Supply chain stories to watch this holiday season

Supply Chain Shakeup // October 12, 2026 Supply chain stories to watch this holiday season By Anna Hensel Ivy Liu Below is the latest edition of Modern Retail’s Supply Chain Weekly newsletter, which goes out on Mondays at 10 a. m. ET, and dives into all things logistics and supply chain during a tumultuous time for the retail industry.

To receive this weekly in your inbox, click here. The holiday season is just around the corner, and with it, retailers will face several crucial supply chain tests.

It’s shaping up to be another eventful and unpredictable holiday season, as consumer sentiment and geopolitical conditions continue to fluctuate wildly in the days and weeks leading up to Black Friday. Consumer sentiment is hovering near the lowest level ever recorded, but spending remains strong.

Gas prices have been climbing since the start of the Iran War, and can see wild fluctuations in a matter of days if there’s a sudden development, like a crucial pipeline being damaged. In turn, retailers still don’t quite know what type of consumer environment they’ll be facing come November and December.

Even though most retailers have already received their holiday inventory at this point, a challenged consumer environment could create supply chain complications in terms of how consumers want to receive their products.

Here are three of the biggest supply chain stories I’ll be watching this holiday season How high gas prices shift what and where people buy Rising gas prices, of course, are the biggest achilles heel retailers will face this holiday season. First and foremost, gas prices will determine how much consumers are willing to spend.

Right now, many surveys are indicating that holiday spending will hold steady this year. For example, a PwC survey found respondents plan to spend, on average, $708 on holiday gifts this season, down 2% from $721 last year. Another factor to watch is how gas prices affect how people buy their gifts.

Historically, brick-and-mortar reigns supreme in holiday shopping. According to an ICSC survey, nearly all shoppers (93%) plan to visit a store for holiday shopping. But rising gas prices may lead them to consolidate trips or shop more online than they normally would.

New delivery methods face a crucial test Every September and October, it seems every major brick-and-mortar retailer announces a new partnership with a same-day delivery company or a new delivery option, and this year is no exception. Walmart, for example, introduced a 1-hour express delivery service that will roll out nationwide ahead of Thanksgiving.

Costco announced new partnerships with DoorDash and Uber Eats, giving people more options than ever to shop from the club retailer without visiting one of its gigantic warehouses. DoorDash also announced a number of new retail partners ahead of the holidays, including Macy’s, Anthropologie and Vans.

This will also be the first holiday season that many delivery platforms roll out new AI list-building features, which they likely hope will upsell shoppers. In September, Instacart unveiled its AI assistant called Clemintine, and the same day, Shipt launched its own “Ask Shipt” assistant.

DoorDash rolled out a shopping assistant that operates via text message, while Walmart has had its Sparky assistant for just over a year now. I’ll be curious to see whether any of these new delivery options — or AI assistants — get any shoutouts during fourth-quarter earnings calls as significant drivers of holiday sales.

How DoorDash changes the crush of holiday returns Speaking of delivery platforms, this will also be the first holiday season that DoorDash returns is in play. In September, the company announced that it was piloting DoorDash returns, with a nationwide rollout expected in September, just in time for the holidays. Consumers pay a $7.

99 fee to schedule a return, and a Dasher will stop by their door in as soon as 30 minutes to pick it up and initiate the return. Of course, not everyone will want to pay a fee to initiate a return.

But considering that more and more retailers are now charging restocking fees anyway, I’m guessing some time-pressed shoppers will fork over the fee without thinking twice about it. And I’ll be curious to see how this eases the crush of holiday returns, if at all, during a time of year when around 17% of merchandise is returned.

What we’ve covered How Amazon Fall Prime Day went for sellers Amazon’s Prime Big Deals Day, held on October 6 to 7, was an early key test of holiday demand. The good news is that shoppers showed up, and they bought more than just essentials.

Modern Retail’s Gabriela Barkho interviewed a few sellers about how the event went — and overall, it went positively for both beauty and apparel brands. They said that shoppers responded especially positively to product bundles. ‘Plastic-free’ is the new battleground in coffee makers In response to consu