CHICAGO—The holidays can be stressful for many people, butretailers have the added pressure of knowing that how well theycompete for shoppers' dollars in the next few weeks can make orbreak their year. And this holiday season, experts anticipate thatshoppers will spend $981 to $986 billion, a roughly 4.5% increaseover last year's total.

JLL has just published its 2014 Holiday Sentiment Report, which includes feedbackfrom about 800 largely national or global retailers in the shoppingcenters it manages across the US, and the data show that eventhough retailers are optimistic, many also believe the competitionwill be fierce and getting their fair share will require tremendouseffort.

Nearly one third of respondents, for example, stated that theirstores will open on Thanksgiving Day. Furthermore, many retailersplan to open up very early on Black Friday to capture as manydollars as possible from the early spenders. Shoppers spend about70% of their money in the first two stores they visit, according toa November report for MasterCard cited by JLL, making it crucial toget those first shoppers in the doors.