America's Best Retailers 2022

Over the last few years, a funny thing happened to brick-and-mortar retailing. It didn't die. Not only that, it appears to be thriving as American retailing continues its recovery from the pandemic. According to the National Retail Federation, total retail sales are expected to grow at a healthy clip of between 6 percent and 8 percent this year to $4.86 trillion, and most of those sales will take place not online but in actual stores. According to the NRF, e-commerce sales peaked at 19 percent of total retail sales in April 2020 and are now about 15 percent.

All of which means, the experience of shopping in a store—the ability to touch and try different products in real life, to get sales help and advice, to enjoy the experience of browsing—is something customers still want and value. To find out which U.S. retailers are doing the best job of satisfying their customers, Newsweek and Statista worked together to create the 2022 America's Best Retailers rankings.

We asked shoppers to rank stores in 39 product categories and awarded the 195 best. Shoppers who participated in our survey were asked how likely they
were to recommend a retailer to friends and family as well as how they ranked the retailer on factors including price, selection and overall atmosphere. The number of winners in each category varies by the total number of eligible companies. For supermarkets, for instance, where there is a very large number of entrants we've named the top ten; for auto parts, where there are fewer brands eligible, we've named the top three. We hope you find our ranking useful as you make your own choices about where you and your family shop.