The news: This year’s Amazon Big Deal Days sale is shaping up to be another success, according to multiple forecasts.

• Bain expects Amazon’s US gross merchandise value (GMV) to rise 7% YoY during the two-day event, making it the retailer’s biggest October Prime event yet.
• Adobe expects ecommerce sales to grow 6.2% YoY to $9 billion.
• That’s close to EMARKETER’s forecast, which projects an 8.8% increase in Amazon’s US ecommerce sales during the event, to $8.84 billion.

The trend: Amazon’s annual sale, along with competing promotions from Walmart, Target, and others, have turned early October into the unofficial start of the holiday shopping season.

• Roughly 1 in 3 Prime Big Deal Days shoppers (31%) plan to use the event to purchase holiday gifts, according to a CivicScience survey. That behavior is even more pronounced among Gen Zers, reflecting their heightened price-consciousness amid growing financial pressures.
• Over 15% of total holiday spending will come before November, per PwC’s holiday forecast—making October sales success a requisite for retailers looking to maximize their share of sales this festive season.

Our take: A strong consumer appetite for October sales could bode well for the holiday season, although we—and most other forecasters—expect growth to slow as uncertainty weighs on spending.

However, a solid Big Deal Days performance from Amazon will put the retailer in prime position to capture a larger share of holiday budgets as shoppers prioritize value.