December is the month when email plans meet real life. Black Friday ends on Monday 30 November, Christmas emails start the next day, and half the people who need to approve them are winding down for the holidays. Boxing Day and the January sales then need to be built and signed off before anyone goes on leave.
This plan covers December 2026 to mid-January 2027 for the UK, US, Canada, Australia and New Zealand.
The key dates
- Friday 4 December, at sundown: Hanukkah begins, ending at nightfall on Saturday 12 December (Hebcal).
- Friday 25 December: Christmas Day.
- Saturday 26 December: Boxing Day.
- Monday 28 December: the substitute Boxing Day bank holiday in the UK (GOV.UK). Australia and New Zealand also have a Monday holiday for Boxing Day for many workers (see the market notes).
- Friday 1 January 2027: New Year's Day.
- Monday 4 January 2027: the substitute bank holiday for 2 January in Scotland.
The December timeline
Week of 30 November: from Black Friday to Christmas
- Send Cyber Monday and any extension. Then stop the sale emails cleanly.
- Give people who bought over Black Friday a break of a few days.
- Get your Christmas gift guides signed off, if they aren't already.
Week of 7 December: gift guides
- Send gift guides by person ("for him", "for the cook") or by price ("under £25").
- Send a Hanukkah email in the US if it fits your audience. It started on 4 December, so this should be planned in November.
- Brief and build the Boxing Day and January emails now. This is the most important task of the week.
Week of 14 December: last order dates
- Send the "last order dates" email for standard delivery.
- Get every Boxing Day, New Year and January sale email approved by Friday 18 December.
- Check who is covering over the holidays and who can approve a change.
Week of 21 December: last chances and click-and-collect
- Final "order by" emails for express delivery.
- Click-and-collect and in-store emails once delivery has closed.
- Digital gift cards and e-vouchers for people who've left it too late. They're the one gift you can still sell on Christmas Eve.
- Schedule Boxing Day and the days around it, then check the schedule again.
25 December to 1 January: Boxing Day and the quiet week
- A short Christmas Day message is fine; a hard sell usually isn't.
- Boxing Day sale, then a reminder later in the week.
- New Year emails, if you send them, are best kept simple.
January: the sales and the comedown
- January sale emails for your engaged subscribers.
- A slower pace for everyone else (see "fatigue" below).
Last order dates: take them from your carriers
Don't guess these or copy last year's. Every carrier publishes its own dates, by service and destination. Royal Mail, USPS, Canada Post, Australia Post, NZ Post and the big couriers all publish theirs, usually in the autumn. Some hadn't published 2026 dates at the time of writing.
Take the dates from each carrier you use, add your own warehouse cut-off, and then add a day of margin. That gives you the date to put in the email.
- One email per delivery option. Standard first, then express, then next-day.
- Per market. Your Canadian and Australian last order dates won't match your UK ones, especially for international orders.
- Say what happens after. Point to click-and-collect, gift cards or "arrives after Christmas" once the date has passed.
- Turn the banners off. A "Still time to order" banner left in a template on 23 December causes complaints.
Gift guides
Gift guides solve a real problem: people don't know what to buy.
- Group by person or by budget, not by your category names.
- Show prices in the reader's currency.
- Five to eight products per email is plenty. Link to a longer page for the rest.
- Reuse one template with swapped products. It's quicker to build and approve.
- Translate the guide, not just the products. Gift-giving habits differ between markets, so ask your local teams what to lead with.
Boxing Day and Boxing Week
Boxing Day is on Saturday 26 December in 2026. It's still a big sale day in the UK, Canada, Australia and New Zealand, but it matters less than it did. In Canada, Moneris payment data for 2025 put Boxing Day at less than half of Black Friday's volume, while 22 and 23 December were among the busiest days of the season (Retail Insider).
- Send early on Boxing Day morning in each market's time zone, so the email is waiting when people start browsing.
- Consider a preview on 24 or 25 December to your best customers, if your brand suits it.
- Run Boxing Week in Canada, from Boxing Day into the following week.
- Plan one or two follow-ups, not daily emails, unless your engaged segment buys every time.
January sales
The January sale is the long tail of the season. By now many subscribers are tired of offers, so watch your unsubscribes.
- Lead with the end of the sale, not the start. "Final week" gives people a reason to act.
- Switch to useful content once the sale ends: how-tos, new arrivals, plans for the year ahead.
- Use January to clean the list. Run a re-engagement email to people who didn't open anything in the busy season, then stop emailing those who still don't respond.
Unsubscribes and fatigue
By late December your list has had more emails in six weeks than in the previous three months. Some unsubscribes are normal and healthy. Complaints are the number to watch. Gmail and Yahoo both expect bulk senders to keep spam complaints low, and Yahoo asks senders to honour unsubscribes within two days (Yahoo sender best practices).
- Give engaged and less engaged subscribers different schedules.
- Offer "fewer emails" or "pause until January" on your preference page, if your ESP supports it.
- Plan the quiet period. The days between Christmas and New Year don't need an email every day.
Approvals and out-of-office cover
This is where most December plans go wrong. The emails are fine. The people who need to approve them are on leave.
- Set the sign-off deadline before people leave, not before send. For 2026, aim to have everything up to mid-January approved by Friday 18 December.
- Get every approver's leave dates in November, and name a backup per market.
- Agree who can approve an urgent change over the break.
- Use automatic reminders. A reminder the day before the reply-by date, then one after it, does more than chasing people by hand in a busy week.
- Approve translations too, before your language reviewers go on leave.
- Keep the record. In January someone will ask who approved the Boxing Day prices.
If you plan this in Mailfois, each campaign has its build-by, sign-off and send dates by market, outside approvers get a private link, and reminders go out automatically before and after the reply-by date. You can see how that works on the email campaign planner page.
Market notes
UK
Christmas Day is Friday 25 December, Boxing Day is Saturday 26 December, and the substitute bank holiday is Monday 28 December. In Scotland, the 2 January bank holiday moves to Monday 4 January 2027. The January sales are still a fixture, so plan them as a campaign in their own right.
US
There's no Boxing Day. The main moments are last shipping dates, Christmas, Hanukkah (4–12 December 2026) and New Year. Many brands send "happy holidays" rather than "Merry Christmas" to a mixed audience. Check last shipping dates with USPS, UPS and FedEx for your services. Late December and January are good for gift card redemption and returns emails.
Canada
Plan Black Friday and Boxing Week as two separate peaks. Moneris data suggests the last few days before Christmas now matter more than Boxing Day itself. If you sell to customers in Quebec, build French versions of every email and allow time for French approval before people go on leave.
Australia
Christmas is in summer. The school holidays start in December and run into the new year, with dates that vary by state, and many offices close between Christmas and New Year. Boxing Day is Saturday 26 December, and the Fair Work Ombudsman lists Monday 28 December as an additional public holiday for Boxing Day (Fair Work). Rules differ by state, so check each one you send to. Summer content (outdoors, travel, entertaining) works better than snow and fireplaces.
New Zealand
It's summer here too, and many businesses close for a few weeks over Christmas and New Year. Boxing Day falls on a Saturday, so for people who don't normally work Saturdays the holiday is observed on Monday 28 December (Employment New Zealand). Send on New Zealand time: the country is ahead of Australia, so your Boxing Day send should go there first.
Plan next year now
Plan next Christmas in January, while you remember what went wrong: what sold, which emails were approved late and why. Then put the dates into the email marketing calendar for 2027.
Frequently asked questions
When should Christmas emails be approved?
Before your approvers go on leave, not before send. In 2026, aim to have Boxing Day, New Year and January sale emails signed off by Friday 18 December.
Should I send emails on Christmas Day?
A short, warm message can work. A hard sales email usually doesn't. Most brands are better off scheduling the Boxing Day sale to go out early on 26 December.
Where do I find last order dates?
From your carriers. Royal Mail, USPS, Canada Post, Australia Post, NZ Post and the couriers publish their own Christmas dates. Add your warehouse cut-off and a day of margin.
How do I avoid unsubscribes in January?
Email less engaged people less, offer a "pause" option, and switch to useful content once the sale ends.
