The advocacy group People’s Union USA has announced a month-long “December Blackout” campaign urging consumers to stop spending money at five major American corporations ahead of the holiday season.
The boycott — which targets Amazon, Target, Walmart, Kellanova (formerly Kellogg’s) and Home Depot — is intended to put pressure on corporations that the group claims have “manipulated the cost of living, driven inflation, and treated the American people as a revenue stream instead of human beings.”
People’s Union USA is a fledgling grassroots organization that advocates for economic resistance, often through consumer boycotts, according to its website.
“December has become the most profitable month of the year for the corporations that drain our economy, raise prices without cause, and funnel their record profits into political influence instead of community wellbeing,” the union said. “These companies survive because the people keep feeding them. So this month, we stop feeding them.”
The National Retail Federation (NRF) projects that retail sales in November and December 2025 will grow between 3.7% and 4.2%, reaching approximately $1 trillion in total spending. This equates to an average of $890.49 per person for holiday items, the second highest in NRF’s 23-year survey history.
In anticipation of this consumer demand, the NRF expects retailers to hire between 265,000 and 365,000 seasonal workers, though this is a significant decrease from the 442,000 seasonal hires in 2024.
The People’s Union argues that this holiday spending cycle is a form of exploitation.
“‘Holiday spirit’ has been weaponized into pressure, guilt, and overspending,” the statement reads. “Families go into debt to fulfill expectations created by companies that do not care about their lives, their wages, or their future. This year, we break that cycle.”
The December action builds on the union’s previous efforts, which included a highly-publicized “Economic Blackout” in February. This activism reflects a wider trend, as the Ipsos Consumer Tracker found that one in four Americans report having stopped purchasing from a company due to politics or current events.
While the movement seeks an outright halt to spending at major chains, the Ipsos data highlights the reality of the “say-do gap” in consumer follow through.
Among those who have attempted a boycott, 61% said they successfully reduced spending but found stopping completely “impossible,” and over half (51%) found it challenging to change their established purchasing patterns. Ipsos said this difficulty is often due to the inability to find a better alternative (30%) or the affordability (27%) of alternatives.
The survey also states that 68% of boycotters try to offset their reduced spending at one place with increases spending at companies that better align with their values.
The Ipsos study concluded that this growing trend should “give brands some pause… as they both customers and brands try to navigate and know our new America.”
In addition to urging customers to avoid major retailers throughout December, the union has organized three specific collective events:
- The “Christmas Boycott:” Consumers are urged to “keep their money local” by spending exclusively at small shops, local makers, family businesses and community markets to strengthen local economies
- “New Year’s Eve Blackout:” This event encourages people to stay home and stay local to “starve the big chains of the final cash grab of the year.” The union emphasizes that New Year’s Eve is one of the biggest revenue days for major corporations
- The “Church Contribution Pause:” The union encourages participants to pause contributions to churches. The reasoning provided is a protest against the tax system: “Many churches operate tax-free while the people funding them are taxed at every corner… When we stop paying into systems that do not pay into us, change happens.”