Chicago Fed sees April retail sales rising, Home Depot demand stays steady

The Chicago Fed’s latest April nowcast pointed to a 1.1% gain in retail and food services sales excluding motor vehicles and parts, a modest signal that spring demand was still holding together. For Home Depot associates, that reads less like a shopping boom than a steady floor of project traffic, with customers still showing up for pickups, add-ons and the kind of single-trip decisions that make or break a basket.

The Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago’s CARTS model, which blends eight weekly indicators including payment card transactions, retail foot traffic, gasoline sales and consumer sentiment with U.S. Census Bureau monthly retail data, put the April estimate at 0.3% after inflation. The Chicago Fed listed the preliminary April 2026 update for May 7 and the final April release for May 13, giving store leaders an early look at whether shoppers were keeping up their pace as the spring season moved forward.

Inside a Home Depot store, that kind of number matters most on the busiest days and in the pressure points that define a good visit. A modest positive reading suggests weekend traffic could still be reliable, but not necessarily broad-based. It also points to the kind of environment where associates are asked the same practical questions over and over: what fits, how much is needed, what is in stock, and how quickly can it be pulled for pickup or loaded into a truck. In that setting, speed and clean replenishment can matter as much as price.

The reading lands during a key merchandising window for The Home Depot. The company launched its Spring Starts event on March 19 and ran it through April 1, aiming at both pro and DIY customers during the heart of seasonal project work. That overlap makes the Chicago Fed’s nowcast useful as a backdrop for the way spring promotions translated on the floor, whether customers came in for patio work, outdoor cleaning, repairs or larger projects that typically require more than one aisle and more than one associate.

The broader company context has been steady as well. On February 24, The Home Depot said it was the world’s largest home improvement retailer and reported fiscal 2025 results. In the most recent quarterly figures in these notes, third-quarter fiscal 2025 sales reached $41.4 billion, up 2.8% year over year, with comparable sales up 0.2%. Second-quarter fiscal 2025 sales were $45.3 billion, up 4.9% year over year. Against that backdrop, the April nowcast suggests a market that is still buying, but buying with a tighter eye on value and a sharper expectation that the store will help turn a need into a finished project.