There will be winners and losers among brick-and-mortar retailers and their landlords during the second half of the holiday shopping season. During the past few weeks analysts and commercial real estate brokers have offered their take on what they expect to see — based on consumer feedback, data and experience — during corporate presentations or in interviews with CoStar News. Here's what some prognosticators have to say:

The National Retail Federation and some real estate brokerages are predicting that U.S. holiday sales overall will rise 3% to 4% this year. But markets that have had steady population growth, including second-tier cities that have now attracted more residents and luxury retailers, could perform well above those estimates, according to some industry analysts.

Sun Belt and Southeast cities such as Phoenix as well as Nashville, Tennessee, and Austin, Texas, are among the markets expected to post stronger retail sales growth than the average forecast nationally, said Brandon Isner, CBRE's head of retail research for the Americas. Others agreed, such as Anjee Solanki, national director of retail services for Colliers, and Naveen Jaggi, president of retail advisory services for JLL.

"I think that at the end of the day, the holiday season [retail sales] will be up about 4%, 4 ½ year over year," JLL's Jaggi said. "I think tight markets, affluent markets like a Nashville, like an Austin, like an Orange County in Anaheim, like a San Diego, those will probably beat that national average. I would see for them, 5% to 5 ½ (gains) would absolutely be the minimum expected."

Such markets boast populations with attractive demographics and newly arrived upscale chains, as well as more residents as a result of population shifts from large cities to smaller ones during the pandemic.

Earlier this year, JLL reported that luxury retailers were increasingly opening stores in Sun Belt cities, and also in the Midwest in Detroit, moving beyond New York and Los Angeles as the demand for upscale goods has soared. Other cities such as Atlanta, Miami and Las Vegas have also enjoyed "newfound population growth," and are "experiencing a wave of new luxury openings," things that JLL said could help bump up their holiday retail sales.

In a sign of the times — and the popularity of growing smaller markets — fashion-beauty entrepreneur Kim Kardashian chose Austin as the first brick-and-mortar location for her Skims shapewear line, with that store opening in November attracting a line of shoppers that wrapped around the block.

The high-profile demise of Bed Bath & Beyond, Buy Buy Baby, Tuesday Morning and Christmas Tree Shops this year threw a lot of vacant retail space onto the market. But in many cases, that didn't turn out to be a bad thing for landlords. They were able to backfill those vacancies with stronger tenants, sometimes at higher rents, which is expected to bolster sales at brick-and-mortar shopping venues this holiday season.

The current low vacancy rate for retail space resulted in some of the new vacancies being quickly filled, CBRE's Isner said. Retail real estate investment trusts, and other owners of malls and shopping centers, were able to improve the quality of their tenant rosters, weeding out under-performers, and even bring in different kinds of occupants, according to Isner.

“In these centers, they’re not just full but they have better tenants than they’ve ever had, more solid tenants, so it really could benefit [properties], really could boost sales,” he said.

And the sales numbers for the retailers that replaced defunct tenants will most likely be better than their predecessors, according to Solanki at Colliers. "You’re [comparing] against recent Bed Bath & Beyond sales, which were already going downhill," she said.

So-called retail lifestyle centers, with their open-air layouts and mix of dining and entertainment, continue to gain popularity and are expected to perform well this holiday season, several brokers and analysts said. They are attracting new kinds of tenants — even high-end retailers — and evolving into destinations that attract customers from a wide area rather than just being neighborhood stops to grab a meal, according to Kelly Silverman, a CBRE senior vice president in Washington, D.C. Service-oriented retailers such as gyms, healthcare facilities, grocers and even once-mall-bound retailers, like Lululemon, are moving into the centers.

Lifestyle centers have also gotten a lift as a result of the pandemic, according to brokers and analysts. Americans who have adopted hybrid work schedules which mean not going into the office some days can run out from their homes to visit local lifestyle centers during the day to do some quick shopping or grab a lunch or a snack. That's increasing foot traffic at these retail centers during the day.

"Nationally, even grocery-anchored community centers now see some of the [national retailers] filling the services and [food & beverage] categories," New York-based CBRE executive vice president Cassie Durand said. These types of strong brands bring in traffic and are willing to make significant investments in their stores to get them "to that corporate quality level," according to Durand.

Keisha Virtue, senior research analyst for JLL Retail, said lifestyle centers have become destinations akin to regional malls.

"They are getting cool new tenants... So I imagine they will do well this season,” she said.

A JLL holiday survey found that shoppers aged 30 to 40, mainly millennials, expect to do more shopping at open-air centers compared to other generations.

Commercial real estate brokers and retail researchers shake their heads, and some even scoff, when they hear "malls are dead." Most would agree that many outdated malls are in trouble, but the high-end Class A properties are busy and popular with consumers.

“The best malls have never been better,” Isner said.

Some retail landlords have been tearing down vacant or ailing malls or redeveloping them into mixed-use sites — adding housing or healthcare uses, for example, to drive foot traffic. And they've been rejiggering their tenant rosters, adding more dining and entertainment options, including what's been dubbed "eatertainment."

Malls are also popular with wealthy and young shoppers, according to Virtue, who cited JLL's holiday survey. Affluent shoppers are more likely to shop at malls, at 49.1%, as well as order online for home delivery. And more and more malls have opened wings dedicated to luxury retailers to cater to those upscale shoppers.

Almost half, or 49.6%, of primarily Gen Z shoppers — those aged 18 to 29 — will shop in malls compared to the 40.8% average, according to JLL.

The tenant rosters at malls also offer shoppers a wide array of choices that are appealing, according to Solanki. She cited American Dream, the megamall in East Rutherford, New Jersey, that has a luxury section, traditional mall tenants like apparel sellers, some unique shops, and an indoor water park, an indoor amusement park, an indoor ski dome and an aquarium.

“People can go to those projects because you can spend an entire day buying for all different categories of people depending on your income level,” Solanki said.

Coming out of the pandemic and its store and office closures, Americans craved experiences and activities such as dining out where they could socialize with other people. Stuck in their homes during the COVID-19 outbreak, many consumers bought goods, not services. Since the pandemic ended, consumers have continued to spend on entertainment and experiences, such as going out to restaurants, and are expected to continue that pattern this holiday season, according to various brokers and retail analysts.

In fact, that was the key takeaway of JLL's holiday report.

"Consumers' gradual move away from goods spending towards services and experiences is in full effect," JLL said.

Barrie Scardina, president of Americas retail services at Cushman & Wakefield, described venues that combine activities such as pickleball and ax-throwing with grabbing some food and drinks as "competitive socialization."

And consumers are spending more of their holiday bucks on that. Shoppers plan to spend $958 per person this holiday season, with 22.8% of that amount expected to go toward holiday entertainment and experiences, according to JLL.

Nearly 74% of consumers over 60, mostly baby boomers, plan to dine out, compared to only 58.4% of the primarily Gen Z group, those aged 18 to 29, according to JLL. Millennials, those 30 to 44, plan busier schedules, with four or more holiday-related experiences this year, such as taking their kids to a trampoline park, JLL said.

When have holiday shoppers not been looking for a sale?

“I think the search for bargains is evergreen,” Virtue said.

But this year there are myriad reasons for people to hunt down the best prices they can for gifts: still-high inflation; repayment of student loans due again; the end of some government food subsidies; and higher interest rates.

In this macroeconomic environment “definitely the value-oriented [retailers] are going to be big, big winners,” Solanki said.

In this landscape, off-price chains such as T.J. Maxx, Marshalls, Burlington Stores and Ross Stores ar expected to enjoy brisk sales, as are the major discounters such as Walmart and Target. Some middle- and higher-income consumers are "trading down" to find better prices at these stores.

But it's not a slam dunk. Even though Walmart and Target are in a good position to see solid holiday sales, on recent earnings calls they — as well as other chains — were cautious about what may happen and whether consumers with less discretionary money will pull back on spending.

Numerous companies, including everyone from online retailers to apparel brands, have opened pop-up shops during the busy holiday season. A pop-up is a temporary retail space, a short-term occupancy, that can be used to test a brick-and-mortar retail concept, to launch a new product or to quickly gain access to and find out more about a new market.

But this year, with retail space so tight because vacancy rates are so low, there’s not going to be a lot of opportunity for pop-ups in some markets, according to Isner.

“Finding this pop-up space when landlords can get a long-term tenant when there’s so much demand for these spaces — especially in the top trade areas — it can be difficult to find these spaces that are vacant,” he said.

Isner's colleague Durand agreed it was a tough year for pop-ups.

"A lot of real estate that would be appropriate for a pop-up, whether the location or the actual physicality of the existing conditions of the space ... a lot of that real estate is accounted for, ” she said.

Aside from the supply issue thwarting pop-ups, global retailers that might have planned to open them to test the U.S. market have pulled back because the dollar is very strong relative to foreign currency, according to Durand.

“So I do believe that has tempered some of the pop-up activity by being a bit cost-prohibitive, perhaps, or a lower priority for some of these international brands who may have wanted to test for 2023 holiday," she said. "And of course, the cost of capital is extremely high.”

Other retailers such as Kohl's, Gap, Macy's and Express have been trying to bolster sales that have either been down or have been lagging. Their management teams, in some cases relatively newly installed, have been busy putting turnaround strategies in place. The holiday season will be a yardstick for how well their efforts have worked.

JLL's Virtue told CoStar News that Kohl's is "definitely one to watch this season.”

The large chain was under fire by several activist groups several years ago. CEO Michelle Gass exited the company and Tom Kingsbury was named permanent CEO in February. A veteran of off-price seller Burlington Stores, Kingsbury has been changing Kohl's product mix, bringing in more apparel lines geared to younger women, for example. Kohl's is also benefiting from the success of its Sephora in-store shops, an initiative that Gass launched.

This year, Kohl's has made a stepped-up effort to boost holiday sales. The front of the stores are chock-full of Christmas merchandise, both decorations and gifts. In one North Jersey location, there was a giant stuffed dinosaur near the entrance for parents and kids to pose for selfies, like the huge Geoffrey the Giraffe at the Toys R Us flagship at the American Dream megamall.

But sales activity going into the holiday season hasn't been good for Kohl's and some other retailers. In Kohl's case, in the third quarter, net sales dropped 5.2% year-over-year, to $3.8 billion, with comparable sales down 5.5%. Kohl's President and Chief Operating Officer Dave Alves, who joined the retailer in April, abruptly left the company just a few days before it reported its earnings in November.

Despite those bumps, Kohl's is high on consumers' radars. It ranked No. 5 in terms of places that shoppers plan to go this holiday, behind No. 1 Amazon, Walmart, Target and Macy's, according to a JLL survey.