The World Cup provided a much-needed boost to the retail industry this summer

Global Retail // July 20, 2026 The World Cup provided a much-needed boost to the retail industry this summer By Gabriela Barkho Despite some early doubt, the 2026 FIFA World Cup has served as a major marketing and retail catalyst for the U. S.’ s retail and service industries throughout the summer.

From tourists’ obsession with ranch dressing to viral Waffle House trips, the 2026 World Cup brought a much-needed boost to the U. S. retail and service industries this summer. Host cities, in particular, experienced a surge in consumer activity as millions of international and domestic fans flocked to stadiums and fan zones.

This influx of visitors delivered a revenue boost from foot traffic as people spent more on sports merchandise, watching games at bars and restaurants and even hosting their own watch parties.

Restaurant and bar service reaches a fever pitch Bank of America transaction data shows that consumer spending was strong in June — likely driven at least in part by promotions and campaigns tied to the World Cup — as some major host cities saw accelerated growth in certain categories.

As just one example, restaurant spend in World Cup host cities was up 6% year over year from June 10 to June 30, while it was up slightly more than 4% elsewhere. During June, total consumer discretionary transactions among households were up 6. 3% year over year.

S ara Walsh, managing director of payments performance at Bank of America, said a lot of the growth has been particularly in food services. “Certain tourist-heavy cities have performed particularly well, with New York/New Jersey around the MetLife Stadium area as the highest performing in terms of growth for spend,” Walsh said.

Bars and restaurants in the New York City area — where a large number of matches happened, including the final — enjoyed some of the biggest increases in sales. That momentum continued in July during the knockout rounds that took place across most host cities.

During the second week of July, Bank of America’s aggregated credit and debit card data shows overall in-person year-over-year spending rose over 6% in Boston, over 2% in Kansas City and just under 2% in Los Angeles.

Walsh said it’s likely that as more people became invested in the World Cup games and their favorite team, they increased their discretionary spending accordingly. That could mean anything from buying a jersey to organizing a friends-and-family gathering at a local bar.

The influx of international visitors also appears to have led to an increase in traffic at restaurants and bars near stadiums. “We’ve seen that 17% of the increase in spend has come from international customers visiting our host cities,” Walsh said. So it makes sense that a number of restaurant chains quickly moved to capitalize on the influx of tourism.

Chipotle’s World Cup BOGO deal led to its biggest store traffic day of 2026. Waffle House, meanwhile, opened a merch pop-up in downtown Atlanta near the official FIFA Fan Fest site.

Walsh said there has been an overall positive year-over-year growth in discretionary transactions in categories like apparel and food service during the World Cup, especially compared to 2025. “That’s actually the strongest growth we’ve experienced in the last four years, and the increase is almost entirely due to discretionary spending,” she said.

Retailers strike with international tourists Retailers like Walmart and Target have reported early sales increases since the start of the tournament on June 11. And as it turned out, even international tourists couldn’t resist a Target run. Target has been tracking international shopping transactions across the 11 host cities across the U. S.

The data shows that local excitement in match host cities has had a substantial impact on sales. Stores in those markets have sold 66% of Target’s total FIFA World Cup 2026 merchandise, while only representing about 25% of total Target locations. On a per-store basis, Target says the host city markets are moving 2. 4X more product than non-host markets.

Target’s full host city ranking, from most to least international transactions, includes Los Angeles in the top spot, followed by New York/New Jersey, Dallas, San Francisco and Miami.

“Right now, millions of fans from around the world are discovering that a Target run is a key part of this year’s World Cup experience,” a Target spokesperson said in an emailed statement.

“We’re seeing genuine enthusiasm from both our longtime guests and international visitors experiencing the joy of Target through the way we matched the excitement of the tournament. For those new shoppers, it’s making a strong first impression.” Interestingly, it’s not just soccer merch that had customers stopping at Target.

According to the retailer, the top-selling item among international shoppers in host cities was Apple’s AirPods Pro 3 Wireless Earbuds. T