eDesk has today released new figures showing the significant operational pressure retailers experience after the buzz of the Christmas shopping season comes to an end.
While the holiday boom is profitable, it is often a double-edged sword, leading to a flood of returns and customer questions that stretches support teams and quietly chips away at profits. eDesk’s new data identifies this Christmas Returns Hangover as a major problem for profitability and this returns headache is often not considered enough by many retailers. eDesk analysed millions of post holiday customer interactions across thousands of ecommerce sellers to understand the real operational impact of the January returns period. The 45% increase in returns directly causes support teams to slow down, with the time taken to solve an issue climbing by 28%. This drop in service is more than just frustrating; it’s a hidden cost that reduces holiday earnings and risks losing loyal customers.
The central challenge for retailers is to use this moment of pressure as a vital chance to keep customers coming back. The new customer data from eDesk shines a light on the sheer scale of the post-holiday difficulty, which many businesses still fail to appreciate. Key findings from eDesk’s analysis of the peak period include:
- The stress after Christmas is marked by a 34% jump in the number of support requests and a 45% increase in return requests.
- This surge significantly impacts customer experience, with average resolution times slowing by almost 30 percent during the busiest returns period.
- The product categories causing the most post-holiday headaches for retailers are gift sets, clothing, and electronics.
The moment the holiday shopping rush ends, the real pressure starts. Our data shows a near fifty percent spike in return requests, which stretches support teams and quietly reduces the profit retailers worked hard to earn. The smart retailers are not reacting to this. They are preparing for it. Using returns data to predict demand, strengthen operations and set clear customer expectations is how retailers protect margin and hold on to their customers.
– Gareth Cummings, CEO at eDesk.
The findings emphasise that retailers must anticipate and manage the wave of return requests before it overwhelms their support staff by putting practical strategies in place to manage customer expectations during the peak returns period.
