Are you looking to rake in the dough on this year’s hottest seasonal sales dates? Then look no further than our comprehensive sales calendar, where you can find all the seasonal tips for selling merch online.
So grab yourself a coffee and read on for the best tips for selling merch on the key sales dates of the coming year.
Download our eCommerce calendar for 2022
Table of Contents
- Important eCommerce and Holiday Dates for Q1
- Important eCommerce Holidays for Q2
- Important eCommerce and Holiday Dates for Q3
- Important eCommerce and Holiday Dates for Q4
Important eCommerce and Holiday Dates for Q1
Let’s start from the beginning, the turn of the calendar year. The winter eCommerce holiday calendar begins right after the Christmas period, where spending is down as people let their wallets recover from the expensive hangover of the year’s biggest holiday. January is a slow month for most businesses, but there are still some remarkable sales opportunities to get your year started right.
January 2022 Holidays
New Year's Day – January 1st
Day one of the 2022 sales calendar is most associated with New Year’s resolutions — most of which are centered around health and fitness. While this time of the year can be pretty quiet for eCommerce sellers, there’s plenty of opportunities for sports and outdoor merchandise to turn a decent profit.
Product Ideas: New Year, New Me: Best Selling Merch Ideas
National Sticker Day – January 13th
The official line on National Sticker Day is that it’s “a day to celebrate all things stickers and labels.” Sure, it’s never going to be the most profitable day in the retail holiday calendar, but it does illustrate just how many diverse opportunities there are out there in every niche imaginable.
February 2022 Holidays
Lunar (Chinese) New Year – February 1st
Chinese New Year or Lunar New Year is one of the biggest holiday sales events in Asia and anywhere that Chinese communities call home. Leading up to this holiday, people clean their houses and get rid of dirt and clutter to avoid bad luck. It’s increasingly becoming a popular time to buy all kinds of new clothes, following a big de-clutter.
Lots of luxury brands are already capitalizing on this trend, and so should you. Your aspiring store or established presence both can use this ritual to drive sales. Get ahead of it by promoting heavily on your social media outlets. It’s a Lunar calendar, based on the Moo, which means you can use themes like day and night or old and new. Oranges, yes the fruit, and the colors red and orange are the seasonal colors and are meant to bring good luck.
Fun fact – in the Chinese calendar, years correspond to specified zodiac animals such as the year of the rat, pig, or ox. Find what animals represent the year (2022 is the year of the tiger), and use them in your marketing to get more into the holiday spirit!
Super Bowl LVI Sunday – February 13th
Super Bowl Sunday is a massive event for football fans, and if you happen to be in a fitness or sports niche, this could be a highly profitable weekend in your sales calendar. You’ll need to steer clear of copyright infringements, but that doesn’t mean you can’t design clothing with humorous or motivational slogans.
Valentine's Day – February 14th
Valentine’s Day needs no introduction. Along with Christmas and Halloween, this is one of the most important eCommerce holidays for online businesses. According to the National Retail Federation, consumers spent nearly $22 billion on Valentine’s Day in 2021, representing a massive sales opportunity and helping make the cold winter feel cozier with the promise of big profits.
March 2022 Holidays
International Women's Day – March 8th
You just had Valentine’s Day, right? Good news, some of those items and designs might work well into International Women’s Day. However, IWD is also less about love and more about celebrating the role of women in society, and also has a certain element of Spring to it. This holiday is all about promoting women and bringing attention to issues that affect them most.
The good news? According to the UK’s Online Retail Association, less than half of retailers surveyed mentioned IWD in their marketing, and only about 10% launched a dedicated product. That makes IWD an excellent choice for niche products and an interesting entry for your eCommerce holiday marketing calendar.
Empowering women through messages of support or products about Women’s issues should help you get both traffic to your site and dollars to a worthy cause.
St. Patrick's Day – March 17th
Green is the color of the day for this celebration of all things Irish. According to the National Retail Federation, 49% of Americans plan to celebrate Saint Patrick’s Day and will spend around $40 each on the occasion.
Apparel like tees, scarves, hoodies and hats are popular items to be given the green shamrock treatment, and there’s plenty of opportunity for catchy slogans too. To help get you started, we’ve mocked up 10 Free St. Patrick’s Day Designs so that you can cash in on this billion-dollar sales opportunity.
Important eCommerce Holidays for Q2
Spring is a time for renewal, growth, and plenty of cleaning. It’s a refresh and reset season, so work with the crowd to boost your sales on important dates. Here are some tips for a successful spring sale season:
- Pay attention to weather patterns – the shift in seasons brings weather-related sales opportunities.
- Spring colors – green, yellow and pink – are great for merchandise.
- If you’re not thinking about sustainability, now’s the time to introduce it into your product portfolio.
April 2022 Holidays
Easter Weekend – April 15th to 17th
Easter is another heavy-hitter in the eCommerce holiday marketing calendar, with nearly 4 out of 5 US adults planning on celebrating the holiday this year, with an average spend of around $180 per person over the weekend. As far as demographics go, it’s interesting to note that younger Americans have been celebrating Easter more than older Americans, with 85% of 18 to 34-year-olds expected to observe the Easter holidays, versus only 74% of those 55 and older.
There’s enormous potential for business owners to earn big on upcoming holiday sales, not just with Easter-themed gifts but with online shopping in general. In one survey, 46% of participants said they intended to purchase clothes for Easter weekend, and 59% said they would buy gifts.
So what can you sell over the Easter period once you’ve exhausted egg and bunny-themed presents? The sky’s the limit here, but we’d suggest sticking to fresh, spring-themed designs with floral patterns and pastel colors.
Earth Day – April 22nd
Sustainability and environmentalism are huge these days, as is the increasing power of celebrations like Earth Day to capture both the imagination and the dollars of committed shoppers. Most of the products you’ll want to market on this date in the retail marketing calendar should be sustainable, or themed with sustainable messages for things like plastic reduction, animal habitat preservation, or zero-waste lifestyles.
Earth Day is a great opportunity to showcase your dedication to a cause. Most retailers will sell themed products and use part of their proceeds to fund environmental causes. It’s also an excellent opportunity to reach out to your audience with some low-cost, good cause merchandise to get them thinking about you.
Product Ideas: Eco-friendly products
May 2022 Holidays
Cinco de Mayo – May 5th
Although a pretty low-key festival in Mexico itself, Mexicans worldwide and especially in the USA will celebrate this holiday on May 5th, along with thousands of non-natives who love the country and its culture.
This holiday is heavily commercialized in the USA, being more about Mexican food and drink than heritage or culture. Nevertheless, print-on-demand sellers still have plenty of opportunities to drive sales on this day, using the Mexican national flag’s green, white and red colors for inspiration.
Mother's Day – May 8th
Mother’s Day is another major holiday in the retail calendar where people tend to spend big. In 2021, consumers spent more than $28 billion on this holiday, and it’s expected that the figure will be even higher in 2022.
While jewelry is always a favorite gift, Americans spend an average of $204 each on clothing and accessories, totaling $2.3 billion in sales overall. Those figures should make aspiring eCommerce business owners pay attention and inspire them to capture some of those dollars for themselves.
Memorial Day – May 30th
Memorial Day is an official United States holiday to commemorate those who served their country and honor the memory of the people who lost their lives doing so. For that reason, this is always going to be a tricky occasion when it comes to product recommendations and marketing opportunities.
The best advice we can give on this sensitive holiday is to avoid selling Memorial-themed items in your eCommerce store and try to be as thoughtful as possible when it comes to marketing campaigns and discounts.
So what should you do instead? Well, Memorial Day weekend has come to mark the official start of summer, so this is a good time to get your store ready for summer-themed items and outdoor activities, and start offering some enticing discounts.
June 2022 Holidays
Pride Month – June 1st
June is now recognized as Pride Month all around the world. This is a great time to promote ideas of kindness and inclusivity and an ideal time for LGBTQ creators to market and showcase their designs and products to the broader community.
Father's Day – June 19th
Father’s Day is a big day in the holiday sales calendar, with over $20 billion being spent on the run-up to this date. Dads can be tricky when it comes to gifts, so try and offer unique niche products and creative designs that stand out from the crowd. Funny and sarcastic t-shirts are just what the doctor ordered to get a smile on dad’s face, and if you can come up with a hit slogan like “World’s Best Dad,” then you’ve got a chance to make some serious online sales!
Important eCommerce and Holiday Dates for Q3
The summer season is the period of the retail sales calendar when shoppers are out hunting for deals on nearly everything. After Memorial Day, customers will be looking for holiday-themed products and Americana-style items, but they’re also expecting special discounts on everyday things they’d like to purchase, from clothing to appliances.
Sharpen your marketing tactics to lure in shoppers during this competitive time in the sales calendar, making sure you’re competing on both themed items and price — both of which are important during the busy summer season.
July 2022 Holidays
Independence Day – July 4th
No other holiday can compete with Independence Day for uniting Americans in celebration. This is a day of BBQs, fireworks and partying, and a prime opportunity for print-on-demand sellers to rack up some serious profits.
While you’d think stars-and-stripes themed products would be the order of the day, Statista found that only 28% of men and 24% of women actually buy patriotic merchandise. So what should you concentrate on instead? Well, with nearly 50 million Americans hitting the road to meet with friends and family, travel-related products and items that would be a hit at an outdoor party seem like obvious choices.
August 2022 Holidays
International Cat and Dog Days – August 8th and 26th
Whether you’re in team Felix or Fido, there’s a special day to celebrate your furry friends, and both are held in August. Pet-themed products are a massive niche for print-on-demand, with Etsy sellers like Chris Sattes proving that you can offer all sorts of weird and wonderful items for pet lovers and turn a serious profit in the process.
Product Ideas:
National Book Lovers Day – August 9th
Sure, you may not have heard of National Book Lovers Day, and the event might not have the same opportunities for profit as the biggest holidays like Halloween. Still, many print-on-demand sellers have found success in less crowded niches, and book-themed apparel offers plenty of scope for exciting designs and slogans — copyright permitting, of course!
September 2022 Holidays
Labor Day – September 5th
Labor day is typically a time where retailers acknowledge the end of the summer and the beginning of fall, offering heavy discounts to clear out the last of the summer stock. This is a great time to not only freshen up your store with new items for fall, but also to make a final concerted marketing campaign to squeeze the last out of any summer or spring themed designs in your store.
Important eCommerce and Holiday Dates for Q4
Fall sales season opportunities are primarily found in decor and fashion, but you’ll also have a great chance to sell autumnal-themed clothing: scarves, hats, and other accessories with great-looking patterns are the perfect accessories as the temperature drops. While they’re not necessarily exclusive to any particular date, you should cash in on these trends while the leaves are turning.
And then we roll back to the Christmas section of the sales calendar – a time for funny sweaters, eggnog, and mistletoe. Cheesy office parties with ugly sweater contests are the norm, so make sure that you’re well-stocked to take advantage of this increasingly popular and somewhat disturbing phenomenon. Socks, sweaters, hats, and scarves are potential wintery sales items customizable for the Holiday season. Design them in funny, cutesy or wonderfully touching ways for some good old-fashioned Christmas fun.
October 2022 Holidays
Halloween – October 31st
Halloween is the spookiest of holidays, the most creative, and potentially one of the most lucrative in the holiday marketing calendar. For Halloween merry makers, it’s all about costumes, themes, and kids running around the neighborhood, getting free candy. All of this spooky activity added up to over $10 billion in sales in 2021 – representing a massive opportunity for online retailers.
What types of products are hot for online sales? Mainly decorations and costume clothing. Get some fun thematic Halloween gear in your store, as well as some spooky decor. Americans, in particular, will spend big bucks to make their house the spookiest on the block.
Get inspiration from our blog:
- 10 spooky Halloween gifts to stock in your online store
- 12 Halloween marketing ideas for your print-on-demand store
November 2022 Holidays
Singles Day – November 11th
Singles Day was invented way back in 1990 as an alternative to Valentine’s Day. Ever since then, marketers and retailers have used the day to encourage singles to indulge themselves and take part in a little self-care. However, when Chinese eCommerce powerhouse Alibaba decided to start pushing the event in 2009, Singles Day sales went through the roof.
Today, this day represents an excellent opportunity to sell products at discounted prices to shoppers who can’t wait until Black Friday sales. The great thing about Singles Day marketing is that you won’t need special products or kitschy marketing to make sales, just good old-fashioned bargains.
International Men’s Day – November 19th
International Men’s Day doesn’t get the media attention or the commercial sales volume of International Women’s Day. However, it’s still a good time for promoting the accomplishments of men and boys in work, school, sport or any other aspect of life.
IMD is an excellent day to draw attention to your store and products if your primary audience is male, and the day lends itself to positive messages and photos on social media.
Thanksgiving – November 24th
Thanksgiving is a time for family reunions and sharing. This popular holiday marks the start of the crazy sales weekend bookended by Black Friday and Cyber Monday. You’ll have plenty of opportunities to make big profits over that weekend, so use Thanksgiving to raise brand awareness and generate a little buzz for the upcoming sales.
Thanksgiving-themed social media feeds, targeted emails and exclusive offers will all go down well on this day and help to keep your products fresh in your customers’ minds.
Black Friday – November 25th
Black Friday is the all-important, all-consuming shop-till-you-drop day of the retail holiday calendar, and it’s increasingly going digital. In 2020, Black Friday sales went up 22% for a record-breaking $9 billion!
Black Friday deals are all about limited availability and limited time to take advantage of significant discounts. Keep this in mind as you develop your marketing materials, as you will be competing for your customers’ attention like no other day of the year. Don’t limit yourself to gift items, either; this is the unofficial start to the Christmas holiday shopping season, and it’s the perfect time to sell festive decorations.
Cyber Monday – November 28th
Cyber Monday is still the king of the eCommerce holiday marketing calendar in the United States, with people spending $10.8 billion in 2020 alone. 25% of shoppers head to an online store after Thanksgiving day, with 79% of buyers shopping exclusively on the internet. Knowing this, you should probably prepare super early for Cyber Monday to guarantee business success.
Just like Black Friday, most consumers on this day are looking for big discounts. Your competition will be fierce, and you’ll be up against the absolute best products that could serve as substitutes. Plus, there is competition between consumers, too: They’re trying to get the most for their money, so grabbing a share of their spending will be more demanding on this day.
December 2022 Holidays
Hanukkah – December 18th
For every person that celebrates Hanukkah in the United States, fourteen celebrate Christmas. That’s a huge missed sale opportunity if you haven’t added the date to your retail holiday calendar. The final night of Hanukkah is usually reserved for non-traditional gifts, which can be anything from fun socks to sports and leisure items.
Marketing goes a long way to improving sales, and if you add some themed apparel, you’re well ahead of the game. Personalized kitchen items and ornaments with Hanukkah themes work well because Hanukkah is all about spending time with family and sharing meals.
Christmas Day – December 25th
Christmas is, of course, the biggest of all the holiday shopping seasons. While all the deals, offers, and massive discounts happen in the lead up to this day, last minute shoppers may miss out on those and spend more at Christmas instead.
According to the National Retail Federation, 2021 Christmas holiday spending is estimated to exceed $840 billion, growing 8% over 2020. Even if 2022 doesn’t see a significant rise, that’s still a huge figure that any online seller should be excited about getting a piece of.
The most important thing to remember about the Christmas period is shipping times. There’s a cutoff time for Christmas sales each year where carriers can guarantee they will arrive on time. Take note of this date, and be sure to announce it to your customers in good time.
Product Ideas:
- Funny Christmas gifts and ugly sweaters
- Custom Christmas t-shirts
- Personalized Christmas stockings and photo ornaments
Cyber Week II / New Years Eve – December 26th – 31st
New Year’s Eve is usually a time to dress up in fancy clothes and go out for a night on the town. However, more and more people are exchanging the tuxedo for fun sweaters and all kinds of themed outfits, and celebrating at home with their families. That means we have an excellent sales opportunity.
The period after Christmas is also a time for further shopping, with some retailers calling it “Cyber Week II” because of the cycle that follows Christmas gift-giving. Consider offering a discount on winter items during this period of the retail holiday calendar, and make sure that all of your items have good shipping times for your customers.
Holidays never end, but we must
We’re hoping you got the theme of this article: holidays are a regular part of your store’s sales cycle, and by planning around these built-in events in the retail holiday calendar, you’ll be able to boost your sales. The calendar year’s rhythm and flow determine when your items will sell best, so do your research and get those products rolling. If you need any additional help, check out our fantastic resources here at Printify, or contact us, and we’ll try our best to make all of your holiday wishes come true!
Don’t rest! Start the year off right with great marketing tips to get you through the rest of the winter! Download your holiday marketing calendar here and get your Google Calendar ready as well.
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