The countdown to peak season
The busiest shopping period of the year is around the corner, bringing both opportunities and challenges. Peak season is when brands have the chance to turn higher traffic into higher revenue, but only if they adapt quickly to evolving shopper behaviors.
Success is not just about attracting customers. It is about delivering seamless experiences, keeping payments secure, and creating lasting connections that encourage shoppers to return long after the season ends.
Here are three practical ways businesses can prepare for peak season 2025.
Tip #1: Create a seamless shopper experience
During peak season, heavy traffic puts your checkout to the ultimate test.
No matter the channel, shoppers expect a fast, consistent checkout that lets them pay with their preferred payment methods. According to our 2025 Retail Report, 54% of shoppers will leave the store or abandon the online checkout if they can’t pay with the payment method they want.
That’s why offering the right mix of bank and alternative payment methods is key to increasing conversion rates, including:
Local payment methods (LPMs): During Black Friday/Cyber Monday 2024, LPMs drove a 26% higher global average transaction value compared to other methods.
Digital wallets: Apple Pay and Google Pay streamline checkout by cutting steps while boosting security.
Contactless payments: Usage surged to 81% globally during BFCM 2024, underscoring the demand for speed.
Tap to Pay on iPhone: Adoption grew 177% year over year during Black Friday 2024, showing its potential to reduce queues and elevate in-store experiences.
Adopting a single-platform omnichannel approach is crucial to meeting shopper expectations during peak season. With Adyen’s single platform, you can remove friction so every payment feels natural, whether online, in person, or on mobile.
Tip #2: Turn insights into optimal business outcomes
Peak season shopping patterns look nothing like the rest of the year. A loyal customer may suddenly triple their order volume, and average transaction values can rise nearly 30% on Black Friday compared to a normal day.
For rigid fraud systems, this can trigger false alarms, blocking genuine customers at the worst possible moment. Fraudsters also take advantage of the season, with attempts typically showing transaction values 64% higher than legitimate purchases.
This is why data-driven optimization matters. AI-powered systems trained on massive transaction volumes can recognize when unusual patterns are actually legitimate behavior. The result is fewer false positives, stronger fraud protection, and higher conversion rates when sales volumes matter most.
With Adyen Uplift, retailers can optimize for conversion, risk, and cost simultaneously. Built on $1.3 trillion worth of transaction data, it minimizes false declines and improves acceptance.
The Uplift overview dashboard also makes it easy to track payment performance. By surfacing customized recommendations and allowing quick testing, it helps businesses implement improvements in just a few clicks.
Tip #3: Connect with customers through charitable giving
Shoppers are increasingly loyal to brands that share their values. Research shows that:
65% of consumers already give to charity.
45% say they are more loyal to retailers with a strong social purpose.
Even in peak season, customers do not just want deals. They want meaning. Offering a donation option at checkout is a simple way to build that connection.
With Adyen Giving, businesses can:
Allow customers to donate at checkout with minimal effort.
Ensure 100% of every donation goes directly to charity (Adyen covers fees).
Leverage Adyen’s 2025 commitment to match all donations made through the platform.
During Black Friday 2024, US in-store donations rose 56% year over year, highlighting how generosity can scale with sales.
Take the next step to increase sales this peak season
Peak season is not only about short-term gains. It is also a time to learn. The insights, behaviors, and patterns you see now can inform smarter strategies all year round.
By delivering a smooth checkout, leveraging data to balance conversion and fraud prevention, and strengthening loyalty through charitable giving, you will not only capture this year’s peak potential. You will also future-proof your business.
Ready to maximize your results?
Access our Peak Season Playbook to get everything you need to prepare.
Blog methodology
The data in this blog, unless otherwise referenced, was collected during two key periods: Black Friday Day, spanning Friday, November 29, 2024 (00:00 New Zealand Daylight Time to 23:59 Pacific Standard Time), and Black Friday Cyber Monday Weekend, running from Friday, November 29, 2024 (00:00 NZDT) to Monday, December 2, 2024 (23:59 PST). All figures represent transactions processed on the Adyen platform, aggregated at the platform level to ensure anonymity and protect data privacy.
