NRF 2026 made one thing unmistakably clear: loyalty is no longer what brands think it is. On a show floor packed with nearly 40,000 retailers from 100+ countries, the conversations were strikingly consistent. Whether speaking with leaders from Prada, Giorgio Armani, OXXO, Chalhoub Group, Foot Locker, Natural Grocer’s, New Look or Spar, the message was the same: customers look loyal until the moment they’re not.
This year in New York, I spoke about what we call Dark Data — the signals brands already collect but can’t activate because they sit in disconnected systems across marketing, service, commerce and revenue. These signals hold the earliest clues of disengagement, yet most organisations can’t use them in real time. The result is a form of loyalty theatre: customers appear committed, until suddenly they quietly drift away.
Our Customer Loyalty Index (CLI) and Buyer Loyalty Index (BLI) highlight this transient loyalty. In B2C, 77% of customers claim to “love and trust” a favourite brand, yet more than half switch for a better price, a poor experience or a values clash. They rarely complain; they simply quietly quit — opening fewer messages, visiting less often, then disappearing.
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In B2B, 71% of buyers say they’re loyal, but 70% of that is Default Loyalty: staying because switching feels painful, not because the value is strong. When integration barriers fall or a superior offer appears, that loyalty evaporates overnight.
This fragility is happening at a moment when the world is becoming harder to predict. As SAP CEO Christian Klein wrote recently in Fortune, after a year of AI acceleration, climate shocks and supply chain volatility, “nobody knows what’s next.” Forecasting is becoming less useful. Responsiveness is becoming everything.
The New Rules of Loyalty
- Emotional momentum outruns brand affinity Trend‑driven “viral loyalty” spikes fast and fades faster. Gen Z in particular buys on cultural momentum, not long‑held brand love. True loyalty has declined for the first time in five years. Brands must move at the speed of culture — reacting to real‑time signals, then nurturing toward something more durable.
- Service becomes the loyalty engine Half of customers have switched brands after a bad experience. Service interactions now carry disproportionate weight in loyalty outcomes. The brands winning in 2026 are those treating service, marketing and commerce as one connected lifecycle — a theme echoed across NRF’s packed customer theatre sessions with ALDO, Douglas Group Technology and Molton Brown.
- Owned experiences become loyalty hubs Apps and mobile wallets are becoming membership environments. App users are 47% more loyal than users on other channels. At NRF, this was visible everywhere — from gamified loyalty experiences at our booth to conversations with luxury and lifestyle brands exploring how to turn owned channels into value‑rich ecosystems.
- Trust becomes the currency of data exchange Customers are increasingly sceptical of data requests without a clear benefit. Transparency and permission are now competitive advantages.
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From Dark Data to Daylight
Molton Brown is already showing what’s possible. By unifying data and modernising its engagement stack, the brand has delivered seamless, personalised journeys across channels — contributing to a 20% uplift in repeat purchases, 5× more revenue from email, and record omnichannel performance. It’s proof that when signals connect, loyalty follows.
Essential for 2026
In an unpredictable world, loyalty can’t be a programme. It must be an enterprise‑wide capability — one that unites people, data and decisions across the entire customer lifecycle. The brands that thrive won’t be the ones who guess correctly, but the ones who can sense, interpret and act faster than the rest.
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