Gun Violence During the Holiday Shopping Season: The Impact On Retail

Heading into the 2024 holiday shopping season, experts anticipate spending will continue to rise. However, gun violence is thwarting the revenue that many retailers use to bolster their entire year.

The ZeroEyes Gun Violence Research Center analyzed all retail incidents from Black Friday through the end of the year for the 2022 and 2023 seasons—releasing findings in a new report. Here’s a quick look at the key findings.

During the 2022 and 2023 holiday shopping seasons, we found:

• 162 gun incidents, averaging five incidents per day at retail sites.

• 83 fatalities at retailers and an additional 140 injuries.

Of those incidents, 22% happened in shopping malls, 32% across gas stations and convenience stores, and 16% at grocery stores. The remaining incidents occurred at drug stores, boutiques, strip malls, and other retailers.

The reason for most of the incidents was escalations of disputes — contributing to 37% of all retail gun incidents. Those escalations between shoppers, employees, or others ended up closing stores or entire retail facilities 87% of the time.

Entire facility closures doubled from 2022 to 2023, costing retailers billions of dollars in lost sales, damages, paid wages, and losses from looting and theft during the incident.

Continuing to protect retail spaces from gun incidents requires a multi-layered security approach. In addition to guards and detectors at doorways, many facilities are turning to gun detection solutions that layer onto existing security cameras. This provides a proactive and situational awareness layer to prevent unnecessary closures and save lives.