Getting billions of dollars worth of merchandise to actual customers, takes a heck of a lot of fuel. In a high-spending, high-delivery, high-travel kind of season, how does an energy crisis factor in?
“As gas prices remain elevated, consumer sentiment continues to drop or stay fairly depressed, because it just makes people feel really bad about the economy,” said Sofia Baig with Morning Consult.
But just because consumers are cranky doesn’t mean they’ve stopped spending.
“Discretionary categories still remain strong,” said John O'Trakoun, an economist at the Richmond Fed. “The thing that's really surprising is how resilient spending has been in categories that should be really sensitive to high fuel prices.”
Consumers are still splurging on things like foreign travel, vehicles and eating out, O’Trakoun said, and that bodes well for holiday spending. But there’s a caveat for low-income consumers: Their budgets are getting tighter.
“There's some household finances pressures that's going on, and that, in addition to gas prices, I think could impact holiday spending going forward,” Baig said.
On the seller side, retailers may feel the pinch this holiday season because of high diesel prices.
“The cost of goods and shipping is higher,” said Debnil Chowdhury, vice president of S&P Global Energy. “And I think the issue is retailers will have to decide: Do they pass those costs onto the consumers? If they're selling something that's extremely price competitive, it's harder for them to do that.” | 
