With Thanksgiving only weeks away, retailers have plenty of reasons to start pushing deals before the turkey reaches the table.

We forecast that Cyber Five retail ecommerce sales will grow 7.3% this year, accounting for 16.5% of online holiday spending. Adobe expects Thanksgiving Day alone to generate $6.9 billion in sales, up 8.5% from 2025.

But all that spending doesn't necessarily mean consumers want every brand interaction to feel like another shopping trip.

"Thanksgiving is one of the most commercially active but strategically underutilized days of the holiday season," said Julianne Hudson, managing director of strategy and insights at VML. "Consumers are spending, but that doesn’t mean they want the interaction to feel like shopping."

For marketers, the challenge this Thanksgiving is knowing when to push a promotion and when to offer something that fits the occasion.

Not every purchase starts with a shopping trip

“Commercial behavior and consumer mindset are not the same thing,” said Hudson.

That observation is especially relevant heading into a holiday season shaped by tighter budgets and more deliberate purchasing decisions.

We expect US retail sales to grow 4.1% during November and December, below its 4.3% full-year forecast. Meanwhile, nearly three-quarters of US consumers plan to shop Black Friday sales, up 55% in 2025, according to Bain & Company research. Discounts will clearly command attention, but consumers will also be navigating the demands of the holiday itself.

Family (64%), food (53%), and relaxing (34%) top the list of what consumers look forward to about Thanksgiving, according to Butterball's 2026 Togetherness Report.

Those priorities don't preclude shopping. They give marketers more to consider than whether someone is likely to make a purchase.

A consumer comparing television prices and a host ordering a forgotten ingredient may both generate sales, but the messages that serve them best could look very different.

The best Thanksgiving pitch may be a helping hand

Hudson argues that brands should look for ways to support the activities consumers already have planned, rather than treating every interaction as an opportunity to push a promotion.

Thanksgiving hosts could certainly use a hand. While 85% wish their guests will pitch in, only 38% of hosts ask them to, per Butterball’s report.

"During a strained year, one role that a brand could take would be as a helper to the host," Hudson said. "Imagine being the brand that doesn’t ask for the sale but offers support in the moment."

For grocery retailers and food brands, that creates an opening for cooking advice, planning tools, and last-minute assistance. Travel companies could focus on making the journey home easier, while entertainment brands have opportunities around football and family downtime.

This year, convenience could prove particularly valuable.

Our May 2026 analysis of holiday shopping behavior found that 30.2% of consumers compare more retailers than they did two to three years ago, while 27.0% spend more time researching products before purchasing.

That research concerns holiday shopping broadly, but it reinforces the value of helping consumers make decisions with less effort.A promotion can still serve that purpose. Chipotle, for example, offered a buy-one-get-one-free deal to customers wearing soccer jerseys during the 2026 World Cup, generating what the company called its biggest promotional day ever.

The same thinking could apply to Thanksgiving, when consumers are gathering with friends, preparing meals, or settling in to watch football.

Thursday doesn’t need Friday’s scorecard

Marketers need to decide what success should look like before Thanksgiving arrives.

Sales will remain important, particularly for retailers competing for Cyber Five spending. Some 63% of marketers identified sales and revenue as their top performance TV outcome in 2026, according to tvScientific research cited by EMARKETER.

But Hudson sees Thanksgiving as an opportunity to "establish or deepen relationships, not simply drive transactions."

That calls for a broader set of performance measures. Hudson recommends tracking brand recall, consideration, loyalty signups, and engagement alongside incremental sales, new customer acquisition, and repeat purchasing.

A grocery promotion designed to drive last-minute orders has a different purpose from a Thanksgiving football advertisement or a community initiative. Marketers should judge each against the results it was intended to produce.

For Hudson, the goal is to determine "not just whether Thanksgiving marketing converted demand, but whether it created a stronger relationship that continues to drive value after the holiday."

Thanksgiving's projected spending suggests plenty of consumers will welcome a bargain. But brands that limit their strategy to immediate sales may miss opportunities to become part of the traditions and routines surrounding the day.

Black Friday gives brands a reason to sell. Thanksgiving gives them a chance to show consumers why they're worth buying from in the first place.