Judge a store by its festival, not the calendar
Festive trading · By Deepakk Bansal, Director · October 2026 · 6 min read
- Festival dates move every year; compare against the festival, not the month
- Even listed retailers' quarters are bent by where Puja falls
- Each state in the East keeps its own festival year
- Stock, tailors and staff must be ready before the peak, not for it
The date moves, and the comparison lies
Picture a store manager in the East looking at September's numbers. Sales are well down on last September. The area manager wants an explanation, the brand wants a plan, and the team starts to wonder what went wrong.
Very often, nothing did. Last year Vijaya Dashami, the last day of Durga Puja, fell on 2 October 1. This year it falls on 20 October 2. Last September held the run-up to the biggest week of the year. This September did not. Set one against the other and an ordinary month looks like a bad one, while the good one has simply not arrived yet.
This year's Puja comes almost three weeks later
Vijaya Dashami, the last day of Durga Puja, in 2025 and 2026
Indian festivals follow the lunar calendar, so their dates move every year against the months we report in. A comparison with "the same month last year" quietly compares a festival week with an ordinary one. In most businesses that is a rounding error. In stores where a few weeks of festival trade carry the year, it decides whether a season is called good or bad.
Even listed retailers get caught by it
V-Mart, a listed value fashion chain for which Durga Puja is a key sales driver 3, shows exactly how this plays out. In the July to September quarter of 2025, its sales in stores open a year or more grew 11% 4. In the next quarter they were flat, with V-Mart's stores at 0% 5. The company's explanation was simple: a larger share of Durga Puja had fallen in the earlier quarter than the year before 5.
V-Mart then did the sensible thing. It added the two quarters together, which removes the distortion from festive timing, and reported combined growth of 5% in the same stores and 15% in total revenue 5. One festival, two very different quarters, and one honest picture once the festival is measured whole.
One festival, two very different quarters
V-Mart stores' same-store sales growth, as reported by the company
V-Mart was not alone. Brokers previewing the July to September results noted that growth had been partly lifted by Navratri moving into that quarter 6. Shoppers Stop said its October to December quarter was marked by festive calendar shifts that weighed on sales 7. A review of that results season concluded that festive calendar shifts distorted quarter-on-quarter and year-on-year comparisons, particularly for apparel and fashion retailers 3.
If listed companies with analysts and investor calls get caught by a moving festival, a single store certainly will.
How to compare a store with itself
The fix is to line up each year against its own festival, not against the calendar. Instead of comparing 1 to 30 September with 1 to 30 September, compare the 30 days before this year's Dashami with the 30 days before last year's. Do the same for the days after. The festival becomes the fixed point, and the dates move around it.
Check the weekdays as well. Last year Dashami was a Thursday 1; this year it is a Tuesday 2. Which weekends fall inside the Puja days changes how many people come through the door, so line up weekends with weekends wherever you can, and read a single day's figure with that in mind.
We compare our stores this way through the festive season. Lined up on the festival, a month that looked weak often turns out to be a good month that has not happened yet. The same logic applies to targets, staff rosters and stock plans: build them on the festival's days, not on the calendar's.
How big the season is
The stakes explain why this matters. The Confederation of All India Traders estimated that business worth Rs 5.40 lakh crore was done between Navratri and Diwali in 2025, 25% more than the Rs 4.25 lakh crore of 2024 8. Physical shops, rather than online, took nearly 85% of it 8. Ready-made garments alone took 7% of festive sales, as much as consumer durables 8.
Clothes took as big a share of festive spending as durables
Share of India's festive sales by category, Navratri to Diwali 2025, CAIT estimate
In Bengal the festival is an economy of its own. A study for the British Council estimated the creative economy around Durga Puja in West Bengal at Rs 32,377 crore in 2019 9. The trade also needs people: the traders' body estimated that the 2025 Diwali surge created about 50 lakh temporary jobs, in logistics, retail help, packing and delivery 8.
The season, in three numbers
Navratri to Diwali 2025 across India, and Durga Puja in West Bengal
Every state keeps its own year
A national festival calendar misses half the trade in the East and North-East. Assam has three Bihus: Magh Bihu in January, Bohag Bihu in April and Kati Bihu in October 2. Bengal and Tripura start their year with the Bengali New Year in April 2. Odisha has Ratha Yatra in July 2. Sikkim celebrates Losoong in December, and Meghalaya has the Wangala festival in November and its own Christmas holiday in December 2.
Every state keeps its own festival year
Big festivals and holidays in 2026, by state and month
So two stores a few hundred kilometres apart can be in different seasons in the same week. A promotion planned for "the festive season" on a national calendar will arrive early in one state and late in another. We plan each store on its own state's calendar. The useful question is never "when is the festival?" but "when is the festival here, this year?"
The road decides how early you must be
Almost everything a North-East store sells arrives through one gap. The Siliguri Corridor, the "Chicken's Neck", is a strip of land in West Bengal around 20 to 22 km wide that connects the eight North-Eastern states with the rest of India 10. Railways approved a fourth line through it in 2026 to add capacity for passengers and goods 10.
A narrow route makes for a short margin. A delay that costs a day elsewhere can cost a festival here, because a store that runs out in Puja week does not get the week back. Festive stock has to be in the store well before the peak, not just in time for it. A later date this year does not change that; it only moves the deadline.
It also means a reorder placed in the middle of the festival rarely arrives in time to sell. The first delivery has to carry most of the season, so the sizes and colours in it deserve more care than any later top-up. Getting the first delivery right matters more than reacting fast.
The tailor and the team are part of the festival
In celebration wear, the queue at the alterations counter builds in the fortnight before every big day. Every garment that needs a hem or a fitting needs a tailor's hours, and those hours run out before the stock does. The tailoring counter has to be staffed for the festival, not for an ordinary week.
The same is true of the floor. The weeks a store needs every hand are the weeks its own people want at home. With lakhs of temporary jobs created across the trade at the same time 8, the extra hands a store needs are in demand everywhere. Leave, rosters and hiring have to be settled well before the first crowded Saturday, and new people trained before it, not during it.
What to do on Monday
- Re-base the comparison. Compare each festive week with the same number of days before or after last year's festival, not with the same dates.
- Put every store on its own calendar. List the festivals that matter in each state, with this year's dates, and plan promotions, stock and staff from that list.
- Work back from the corridor. For stores in the North-East, set the date festive stock must leave the warehouse by counting back from the festival, with room for a delay.
- Book the tailors. Plan alteration capacity for the fortnight before each big day, and tell customers early how long alterations will take.
- Hire and train early. Agree leave and rosters before the season and train temporary staff before the first rush.
- Judge a new store fairly. For a brand opening in the East, measure the first season against the festival it actually had.
- Public Holidays in India in 2025, Office Holidays, 2025.
- Public Holidays in India in 2026, Office Holidays, 2026.
- What Q3 FY26 Reveals About India's Changing Retail Growth Playbook, Indian Retailer, 2026.
- V-Mart Retail: Business update, Q2 FY26, V-Mart Retail, filed with NSE, 2025-10.
- V-Mart Retail: Business update, Q3 FY26, V-Mart Retail, filed with NSE, 2026-01.
- Consumer Discretionary: 2QFY26 Result Preview, HDFC Securities, 2025-10.
- Shoppers Stop Q3 FY26 results press release, Shoppers Stop, filed with BSE, 2026-01.
- Festive sales surge 25% to ₹5.4 lakh crore during Navratri-Diwali period: CAIT, Storyboard18, reporting a CAIT survey, 2025-10.
- Economic impacts of festivals: A case study of Durga Puja in West Bengal, Down To Earth, 2022.
- Chicken's Neck gets 4th railway line: why the Siliguri Corridor matters for India, Business Today, 2026-08.