With the immediate holiday rush behind you, this quieter stretch before New Year’s is the right moment to close out the year’s records properly, both for tax purposes and for your own planning heading into 2026.
Pull your actual sales and expense totals now, while it’s manageable
Rather than waiting until tax season to reconstruct the year, use this quieter window to pull your total sales, material costs, and other business expenses from throughout 2025. If you’ve been using an inventory or accounting tool like the ones we’ve covered this year, this is largely a matter of running a report rather than manual reconstruction.
Reconcile your actual margins against what you assumed earlier in the year
Given how much we discussed rising material costs following the de minimis exemption ending back in the spring, this is worth a specific, honest look: did your pricing adjustments throughout the year actually protect your margins the way you intended, or did costs outpace your pricing response in ways worth correcting heading into next year?
Document what worked and what didn’t, specifically, not vaguely
We’ve suggested this after nearly every seasonal transition this year, back-to-school, Halloween, and it applies at the full-year level too: write down, specifically, which product lines and decisions performed well, and which didn’t, while the details are still fresh rather than relying on a vague year-end impression.
Review your Star Seller and shop health metrics for the full year
Beyond financials, take stock of how your shop performed on the metrics we’ve discussed throughout the year, response time, on-time shipping, review rating. A full-year view often reveals patterns that a single busy month obscures, whether that’s a consistent seasonal dip in a specific metric or steady overall improvement worth recognizing.
Set aside what you’ll actually need for taxes
If you haven’t already been setting aside a portion of income throughout the year, use this moment to calculate roughly what you’ll owe and set it aside now, rather than discovering the number for the first time when you file. This is a much easier task done deliberately in a quiet week than reconstructed under time pressure later.
What to prioritize in the days remaining this year
Pulling your numbers and documenting your honest year-in-review takes real but bounded time, a few focused hours rather than an ongoing project. Getting it done this week, while the details are fresh and the pace has genuinely slowed, sets up a far stronger foundation for 2026 planning than trying to reconstruct it later from memory.
