Top Fast Growing Retail Brands to Watch in 2026 // pass

As 2026 rolls out, the retail landscape continues to evolve at breakneck pace including AI, strategic store selection, and changed consumer behavior. Which brands are taking the lead early? Expect an exciting mix of innovation, celebrity and influencer collabs, and strategic store openings this year.

At NRF 2026, we learned retailers are now taking to scale and expanding on successful strategies from 2025. We expect strategic store selection, AI-integrations in DTC, and influencer collaboration to matter more than ever.

We’ve put together a list backed by foot traffic data to show you the ones to watch. These brands deserve your attention in 2026.

To see how well your brand and competitors did in 2025, book a call to get a demo.

Our top retail brands to watch in 2026

Skims
Alo Yoga
Mejuri
Pop Mart
UNIQLO
AKIRA
Whole Foods Market
Vuori
American Eagle Outfitters
On Running

1) Skims

Visits: Doubled year on year
Stores: 22 in the US
Rapid store expansion

How did Skims double their footfall in the past year? One, by engaging in an aggresively viral marketing strategy. A number of new products in 2025 caught headlines, including a shapewear face wrap and faux fur underwear, raising awareness of the brand.

Two, Skims doubled foot traffic by opening new stores. The power of physical retail can’t be underestimated and Skims built its growth strategy around that.

In June 2025, Skims announced plans to expand it brick and mortar stores by 16 bringing its total in the US to 22. Skims also planned to establish itself in new markets, including Dubai, London and Mexico.

CEO Jens Grede told BoF that Stores are “probably our single biggest growth lever”, adding that “the biggest barrier for customers is us simply not being available in physical retail where people live.”

Skims has followed in the footsteps of rapid growth brands such as Algo Yoga (also on our to watch list!) by vastly increasing their footfall by quickly opening new stores.

Continusously opening new stores to act as billboards isn’t an easy nor a sustainable strategy for the long term. Skims does have the advantage of having a well-known celebrity co-founder of Kim Kardashian, and a partnership with Nike, so we’re interested to see how this strategy will play out in 2026.

2) Alo Yoga

Visits: over 38% year on year
Stores: over 110 stores
Rapid growth built from a mix of referall programs, community events, and brick-and-mortar presence

The premium athleisure wear brand has grown rapidly in the past year. The growth strategy has leaned on influencer power–the brand’s clothing has been worn by Kendal Jenner, Hailey Bieber, and Rosie Huntington-Whiteley to name but a few–and community engagement while using its growing brick-and-mortar presence as a billboard for its products.

The brand effectively targets its audiences of women aged from 18-35 via these influencer and celebrity collabs, while engaging in wellness and health communities where its target audience can be found.

One example where the brand has found success is engaging in community events, mostly in California. One of Alo Yoga’s latest events takes the brand over to yoga classes in Miami via Little River studio, expanding the strategy to find similar customer segments and continue its success. Alo Yoga is an expert in taking community events and pop up shops to the next level.

This brand is one to watch in 2026 to see how Alo Yoga continues to scale its strategy. If brick and mortar stores are chosen strategically with a good store selection process and its influencer marketing strategy and community events can scale across the country, then the brand can take its trending moments to staying power.

3) Mejuri

Visits: 31.59%
Stores: 30 stores
A fine jewelry trend setter and iconic fashion brand

Fine jewelers Mejuri has increased foot traffic by over 30% year on year: this huge leap in footfall in mostly die to new store openings.

The jewelry retailer has focused on its influencer and celebrity collaborations and has successfully capitalized on 2025’s jewelry trend, putting itself at the forefront of fashion.

One of the biggest jewelry trends in 2025 was stacking rings. Few brands were mentioned as many times as Mejuri for this trend. When looking for stacking rings, Mejuri was one of the first places fashionable consumers would go whether that’s online or in store.

Celebrity names such as Selena Gomez, Gigi Hadid, and Olivia Rodrigo are all attached to this retailer–giving Mejuri an edge; the silver Dome ring worn by Selena Gomez can be purchased for under $150, which gives Mejuri an air of affordable luxury.

One unique feature of Mejuri’s strategy is its PLAY initiative, which features athletes and sport ambassadors wearing its jewelry. Showcasing how Mejuri can be worn everyday, bringing a bit of style no matter the occasion, is at the core of Mejuri’s identity.

4) Pop Mart

Visits: 27.72% year-on-year
Stores: over 25 stores
Blind box collectable Labubus

In 2019, Pop Mart started distrubuting Labubu’s. These collectable blind box plush toys exploded in popularity in 2024 when a member of girlgroup Blackpink Lisa posted a story on Instagram with a Labubu keychain. In 2025, more celebrities from Rihanna to David Beckham have been pictured with one or two (or, in Kim Kardashian’s case, ten) of these plush toys.

As the collectable Lababu’s went from toy to fashion accessary, Pop Mart saw a massive boost in footfall and that trend has not slowed in 2025. Shares of Pop Mart soared by more than 500% in the last year.

However, investor concerns grew at the end of the year due to consumer fatigue and slower sales in the final quarter where sales dropped by 8.6% in the US.

Pop Mart recently announced a new blindbox product – Pucky Tap Tap Babies. These plush key chain products take the fashionable keychain appearance of Lababu’s trendy origin, blind box collectable appeal, while adding a fun addition of making a noise whenever the product is ‘tapped’ by the customer. We’ll have to see how consumers respond in 2026 to Pop Mart’s strategy.

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5) UNIQLO

Visits: -0.58%
Stores: over 70 stores
International retailer making strategic decisions

The only Japanese brand in the Brand Finance global rankings, UNIQLO is an international apparel retail success. With a focus on practical, yet stylish everyday wear, UNIQLO has roughly maintained it’s foot traffic levels from 2025 with only a marginal decrease of -0.58% year-on-year during a tricky to navigate period for the retailer.

Fast Retailing Group, UNIQLO’s parent company, noted the impact of US tariffs in their 2025 statement. However, the company absorbed incurred costs and improved profit margins by reviewing product prices, reducing discoiunts, and implementing stronger cost controls. Despite these challenges, UNIQLO has grown in profit – with its international branch achieveing revenue growth of 11.6% year-on-year.

With UNIQLO targetting a 15% margin in the North America market, we say UNIQLO is one interesting brand to watch in 2026 to see how an international retailer makes highly strategic decisions to maintain and grow.

6) AKIRA

Visits: 16.47% year-on-year
Stores: over 30 stores
Store selection process, expanding into malls

Operating across 12 states, Chicago-based fashion brand AKIRA expanded in 2025 contributing to its over 16% increase in foot traffic. The brand entered Green Aces Mall just in time for the Black Friday rush (its second New York location), in Wolfchase Galleria in Memphis, and in Arundel Mills. Choosing to expand into malls, AKIRA shows how its making strategic decisions to meet its customers and grow its base.

Retailers still see the power in brick-and-mortar retail, particularly in malls for brands such as AKIRA. To see how store selection can be successfully in 2026, we’ll be watching AKIRA.

7) Whole Foods Market

Visits: 3.13% year-on-year
Stores: over 500 stores
Organic appeal combined with Amazon’s convience

While competitor Trader Joe’s footfall has fallen by -2.07%, Whole Foods Market has risen by 3.13% year-on-year.

Owned by Amazon, the grocery giant made moves in 2025 to consolidate Whole Food’s store locations with Amazon’s convience. A new concept “a store within a store” launched in 2025 meant customers can shop organic and natural Whole Foods products alongside Amazon’s everyday essentials online, at the shop, or for pickup. A new 10,000 square foot automated fulfillment centre and in-store QR code scanning puts Whole Foods into new territory.

Utilizing ShopBots to sort and retrieve products through Fulfil, a Silicon Valley robotics company, Whole Foods is at the forefront of innovation in grocery. Will this be successful and can Whole Foods scale it in other areas of the country? Only time will tell!

8) Vuori

Visits: 2.09%
Stores: over 40 stores
Trendy fitness brand with a commitment to sustainability

Combing West Coast style with atheltic practicality, Vuori combines fashion and function with a sustainable ethos for its carbon neutral status. Our data shows this combination style and function, sustainability and luxury feel, has been successful as the retailer has seen a slight uptick in foot traffic of 2.09% year-on-year in a highly competitive field.

At NRF 2026, Vuori’s global president Ashley Ketcher joined a panel alongside retailers Away and Rothy’s. All of these brands mentioned omnichannel retail, but it was Vuori who seemed most interested (in our opinion) on new channels–chief among them, AI. Ketcher said, “It’s still early; we’re testing ChatGPT, and we’re part of the pilot program. 2026 is about being in the forefront of how people shop and how [shopping] is changing].” For AI in athleisure wear, Vuori may be one to watch!

9) American Eagle Outfitters

Visits: 1.3% year on year
Stores: over 800 stores
Viral advertising campaign

We can’t think of another brand that went as viral as American Eagle in 2025. From its advertising campaign featuring address Sedney Sweeney in the summer, American Eagle surged with CEO Jay Schottenstein noteing that American Eagle added over 1 million loyalty members in recent months, while jeans featured in a Sydney Sweeney campaign sold out within days.

American Eagle seems to have solidified its marketing strategy to focus on celebrity collaborations to further its reach, including a partnership with Travis Kelce’s menswear brand True Kolors.

Our data shows year on year American Eagle has stayed steady and seen some slight growth of 1.3% in visits. The retailer is competiting in a tough market, alongside competitor Gap, and using a marketing strategy to capture consumer interest to raise awareness of the brand and get staying power in the long term.

10) On Running

Visits: Doubled year-on-year
Athleticwear at the forefront of the sporting community

Sportswear was on the rise in 2025 and On Running was at the forefront of it all. The brand reported net sales increased by 24.9% year-on-on-year in Q3 2025 and our data shows that On Running footfall doubled year on year.

The Swiss brand is well-known in the sporting field, worn by athletes on the field, on the track, and off. With a strong brand identity of sportswear trusted by professional athletes, On continues to leverage its trusted reputation in its seasonal product launches and celebrity athlete partnerships.

2025 also saw the retailer expand its own brick and mortar presence into new markets from South Korea to Mexico. A solid foundation of trust can result in strong growth and On is one of the best examples we’ve seen of that strategy.

It seems the only thing that could slow On down now is wider market trends and consumer spending, though we can expect On to jump over any hurdle, we’ll be watching carefully to see how consumers act throughout the year.

How to follow retail trends in 2026

Before your competitor’s quarterly report releases, you can already have a good idea of performance by looking at foot traffic data and spend insights. This can help you benchmark expectations of your own stores, get an idea of overall market performance, and aid store selection.