Key takeaways:
- US retail sales growth has continued for six consecutive months, with core retail sales up 7.05% year over year in March 2026, according to the CNBC/NRF Retail Monitor.
- Consumer sentiment is at a record low and inflation is at its highest in two years, yet spending on clothing, health, and sporting goods is surging into double-digit annual growth.
- Building and garden supplies is the only category in negative territory year over year, suggesting consumers are deferring big-ticket home investment while sustaining everyday spending.
The American consumer is, by almost every measure, in a bad mood. Sentiment is at a record low. Inflation is running at its highest rate in two years. Gas prices are rising, driven in part by ongoing trade tensions and geopolitical pressure in the Middle East. And yet, for the sixth consecutive month, US retail sales growth has held.
According to the CNBC/NRF Retail Monitor, powered by Affinity Solutions and released on April 14, 2026, core retail sales — which exclude automobiles, gasoline and restaurants to isolate demand for retail goods specifically — rose 0.41% month over month in March and 7.05% year over year. Total retail sales, excluding only autos and gas, were up 0.40% month over month and 6.59% year over year. For the first quarter as a whole, core sales were up 6.14% and total sales up 6.18%.
These are not the numbers you would expect from a consumer base described, by NRF President and CEO Matthew Shay, as operating under record low sentiment while facing the highest inflation rate in two years. The gap between how Americans feel and how Americans spend is the most important story in retail right now.
What is driving US retail sales growth in 2026?
Part of the answer is structural. The IRS reported that tax refunds averaged $3,521 as of late March 2026 — up 11.1% from the same period in 2025, following changes in tax law passed last year. That injection of household liquidity arrived at precisely the moment gas prices were climbing, and the data suggests it more than compensated. Consumers did not stop spending. Instead, they redirected it.
The Retail Monitor draws its figures from actual, anonymized credit and debit card transaction data compiled by Affinity Solutions, covering more than 140 million cards and nearly nine billion transactions totaling over $500 billion in annual spending.
The sectors that are winning and the one that is not
March sales were up in eight of nine categories on a year-over-year basis. The standout performers are worth examining closely, because they reveal something specific about where consumer priorities currently sit.
Health and personal care stores led all categories, up 12.25% year over year and 0.51% month over month. Clothing and accessories followed at 10.89% year over year, with sporting goods, hobby, music and bookstores close behind at 10.88%. Digital products — electronic books, games, and similar purchases — were up 9.39% year over year, and general merchandise stores posted 8.77% annual growth.
All of them are categories associated with personal investment, physical wellbeing and lifestyle maintenance. The consumer spending trends visible in this data point to a population that is stressed but not retreating; one that is protecting its sense of normalcy even as the broader economic picture deteriorates.
Grocery and beverage stores grew 3.78% year over year, a meaningful but more modest figure that reflects both sustained essential spending and the dampening effect of elevated food prices on unit volumes. Electronics and appliances were up 7.67% annually but grew just 0.06% month over month — a category where consumers are spending but not accelerating.
The one clear exception is building and garden supplies, the only sector in negative territory year over year, down 0.47%. On a monthly basis it also declined, by 0.08%. This pattern has been consistent since October 2025, when the category was already down 8.52% annually. Home improvement can wait. The priority, for now, is keeping up with everything else.
The gap between sentiment and spending
The divergence between consumer sentiment and actual US consumer spending is not new, but it has rarely been this pronounced. Record low confidence readings sit alongside six months of uninterrupted sales growth. The explanation is not that consumers are optimistic (the sentiment data makes clear they are not). It is that spending, for many households, has become a form of stability rather than a signal of confidence.
Tax refunds provided a one-time boost in March. Whether that momentum carries into April and beyond, against a backdrop of sustained inflation and unresolved geopolitical pressure on energy prices, remains the open question.
What the March data makes clear is that US retail sales growth is real, measurable, and, at least for now, resilient. It is also, in the context of everything surrounding it, quietly remarkable.
