Every year, millions of Americans head into stores and restaurants expecting warmth, efficiency, and holiday magic. But behind the counters, another reality is unfolding—one marked by rising stress, intensifying customer aggression, and a workforce pushed beyond its limits.

The 2025 holiday season is shaping up to be one of the most stressful in recent memory for retail and restaurant staff. Customer behavior is deteriorating, and the people who make the holidays possible are bearing the weight.

Customer Rudeness Has Become a Daily Experience

Workers across retail and food service have reported growing incivility for years—and 2025 continues the trend. The Workplace Incivility Institute found a 48% rise in verbal aggression toward customer-facing workers since before 2020. In 2025, a survey of restaurant workers from Steer revealed that 41% report customer incivility has increased since last year.

This is not a handful of bad days. It’s the lived reality of an entire profession.

The Holidays Intensify the Crisis

The holidays are often framed as a time of joy, but for retail workers, they also bring a predictable surge in stress and confrontation.

“Hospitality professionals are often the recipients of guests' frustrations and outsized reactions to situations that frequently have less to do with an actual issue and more to do with what is going on in the guests' lives outside of the restaurant,” notes SA Hospitality Group Director of Operations Abigail Khaishgi.

A 2024 American Psychological Association poll found 65% of Americans feel more stressed during the holidays, often resulting in misplaced frustration toward service workers. Cornell University’s 2025 hospitality research showed restaurant workers experience a 30% rise in emotional exhaustion during November and December, corroborating the Steer survey which showed 53% of workers say customer rudeness increases during Nov–Dec.

As one worker put it:

“The same customer who was polite in October will scream at you in December for being out of peppermint syrup.”

Violence, Threats Now Shockingly Common

While national headlines often spotlight isolated incidents, data shows that workplace aggression is becoming an everyday risk.

The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reported a 17% increase in violent incidents in retail in 2024. A 2025 Service Workers Safety Coalition report found 20% of workers faced physical intimidation last year.

When food and hunger are involved, the stakes are heightened. Steer’s data suggests 40% of restaurant workers were physically assaulted by customers during the year.

One worker reported:

“A customer threatened to come back with a gun because we ran out of chicken.”

Most common forms of aggression include items violently pulled from restaurant workers’ hands (17%), objects thrown at workers (15%), and pushed, shoved, or grabbed (12%)

Sexual Harassment Is a Reality for Nearly 4 in 10 Workers

Sexual misconduct is another layer of risk that disproportionately affects restaurant and retail employees.

Nationally, the One Fair Wage 2024 report found that 70% of women in food service experience sexual harassment at some point in their careers.

Steer’s survey reveals that nearly 39% endured sexually inappropriate behavior in the past 12 months alone:

  • Sexually suggestive comments – 19%
  • Sexual jokes – 15%
  • Unwanted touching – 9%
  • Leering and boundary invasion – 16%
  • Explicit exposure – 6%

This is not limited to bars or late-night venues.Workers across fast food, casual dining, catering, cafés, and fine dining report these experiences. Khaishgi adds “from casual to 3-Michelin stars, I’ve seen it happen and had to intervene in multiple instances of sexually inappropriate behavior."

What We Can Do—Right Now—to Support Frontline Workers

The data is clear: frontline workers are in crisis, particularly during the holiday season. But the solutions start with small, human actions:

  • Practice patience, especially during long lines or shortages.
  • Use polite language—tone makes a measurable difference.
  • Offer a genuine thank you.
  • Avoid offloading personal stress onto workers.
  • Speak up if you witness harassment or aggression.

So this season, choose humanity. Frontline workers make the holidays possible. But the holiday magic increasingly comes at a cost.

A little more patience. A little more generosity. A little more humanity. That’s how we make this season brighter not just for ourselves, but for the people who make it all happen.