Mother’s Day has become the second-biggest retail event of the year in both Colombia and Brazil, driving an estimated R$38 billion in Brazilian sales and average household spending of up to $300,000 pesos in Colombia. Viewed from Bogotá, the commercial momentum is so intense that the capital’s merchants will keep their doors open until midnight under the ‘Bogotá Despierta’ initiative, while 2,100 police officers are being deployed to districts that recorded the highest number of violent incidents during last year’s celebrations: Ciudad Bolívar, Los Mártires, Usme and Usaquén. The security operation underscores a date that, for all its economic heft, remains fraught with public-order challenges.

Yet the spending surge belies a more frugal reality for many households. Analysts in São Paulo note that Brazilian families, squeezed by stagnant wages and rising living costs, are increasingly swapping expensive restaurant meals for beach outings, picnics in the park or simple home-cooked lunches. The Procon-SP consumer agency found that prices for imported perfumes vary by more than 50% between shops, and rose bouquets by nearly 79%, pushing shoppers to hunt for bargains. In Colombia, the retail frenzy unfolds against a stark demographic backdrop: births fell to 433,678 in 2025, the lowest in a decade, as economic insecurity discourages women from becoming mothers. Of the 4.7 million Colombian women heading single-parent households, four in ten describe themselves as poor, according to Anif data.

The strains are felt acutely by women navigating both boardroom and home. In Bogotá, senior female executives interviewed across sectors spoke of the constant negotiation between corporate leadership and domestic responsibilities, even as 65% of Colombian companies report increasing female representation in top roles. Looking ahead, the Mother’s Day tradition appears to be evolving from a pure retail spectacle into a reflection of deeper social pressures: falling birth rates, constrained budgets, and the double burden shouldered by working mothers. As families favour shared experiences over material gifts, the challenge for retailers — and for policymakers — will be to adapt to a celebration that is becoming less about consumption and more about resilience.