Shoppers browse back-to-school supplies at a Walmart in Houston, Thursday, Aug. 6, 2026.
Raquel Natalicchio/Houston Chronicle
Back-to-school supplies and uniforms at a Walmart in Houston, Thursday, Aug. 6, 2026.
Raquel Natalicchio/Houston Chronicle
Shoppers browse back-to-school supplies at a Walmart in Houston, Thursday, Aug. 6, 2026.
Raquel Natalicchio/Houston Chronicle
Back-to-school supplies at a Walmart in Houston, Thursday, Aug. 6, 2026.
Raquel Natalicchio/Houston Chronicle
Back-to-school supplies at a Walmart in Houston, Thursday, Aug. 6, 2026.
Raquel Natalicchio/Houston Chronicle
Eboni Gilchrist spent the early hours of Thursday morning stacking her shopping cart with cases of pencils, reams of copy paper and an array of multicolored binders.
The trip to a Walmart in the Heights capped off a multi-week shopping sprint for Gilchrist, the mother of three children who attend International Leadership of Pearland. She’s also stocked up on stickers and Play-Doh.
“I always catch the deals,” Gilchrist said of her approach to back-to-school shopping. “If something goes on sale before school is in, I come and get it.”
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Like many Houston shoppers preparing for the school year, which starts in many districts next week, Gilchrist is aggressively courting deals — even as inflation cools across the region. A recent Deloitte survey of 420 local parents of schoolchildren found the same trend citywide.
Houston parents will spend an average of $796 on back-to-school shopping, far higher than the projected national average of $557, but in line with consumers in other major metro areas like Dallas-Ft. Worth and Los Angeles, according to the Deloitte survey.
“Parents in Houston are really focused on value and to get the most out of every back-to-school dollar that they’re spending,” Tony Torres, the retail leader at Deloitte’s Houston office, said.
To combat stubbornly high prices, which Torres noted have included substantial increases in gas costs, state and local officials have touted the upcoming tax-free weekend on school supplies, which waives Houston’s 8.25% sales tax on a host of school supplies and clothing under $100.
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“This holiday initiative isn’t just about short-term relief — it’s a cornerstone of financial support for Texas families,” state Comptroller Don Huffines said in a news release, where he estimated the tax holiday would lead to $142.5 million in savings for consumers statewide. Texas families have saved more than $2 billion over the lifetime of the tax holiday, Huffines estimated.
But more than a quarter century after the early August tax-free weekend was first introduced, the policy is facing increased scrutiny from lawmakers who say it needs to be modernized, and tax policy experts who argue it should be scrapped altogether.
“Does it maybe really truly reflect more that there’s something else going on with the state’s tax code that might be better suited for more of a broad-based reform?” Nicole Fox, a policy analyst at the nonpartisan Tax Foundation, said of the holiday.
The tax holiday will come too late for Gilchrist, who said she starts back-to-school shopping in July. She is also focused on large discounts — up to 40 or 50 percent, she said — offered by big box retailers like Walmart and Target in the last weeks of July. Plus, she didn’t want to risk essential items being out of stock.
“I shop too early,” she said with a laugh. “When I go to shop, I’m not worried about the tax. I’m more concerned about the pricing.”
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In 2026, is a tax-free weekend still the right policy?
Deloitte’s survey found that nearly half of all Houston consumers qualified as “hyper-value seekers,” the accounting firm’s parlance for shoppers who are willing to buy in bulk, swap name brands for cheaper generics and switch to more affordable stores in search of a better deal. Nationally, under a third of shoppers fit the same criteria of thriftiness.
“All the data suggests that they’re looking for deals,” Torres said of Houston shoppers.
At Lakeshore Learning Store near the Galleria on Wednesday afternoon, amid dozens of teachers hunting for last-minute classroom supplies, Elizabeth Salazar, a 4th-grade teacher on the city’s Northside, had spent close to an hour browsing and left with her wallet $47 lighter, alphabet stickers and rolls of pink poster paper in tow.
“It’s cheaper here,” the second-year teacher said. “I got things that would have been more expensive on Amazon.”
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But according to the Deloitte study, the tax-savings window — usually the second weekend of August, leading into the first day of classes for Houston ISD — is too late to help most shoppers.
Back-to-school supplies at a Walmart in Houston, Thursday, Aug. 6, 2026.
Raquel Natalicchio/Houston Chronicle
Houston consumers shop early, the study found, with 58% completing their back-to-school purchases by the end of July, before spending tapers off throughout August.
Consumer preferences have also shifted since the tax holiday started, with laptops and other electronics, which are not tax-exempt, making up an increasing percentage of families’ back-to-school budget.
This year, the Deloitte survey estimates that Houston families will spend an average of $550 on tech products.
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State Rep. Charlene Ward Johnson, D-Houston, said she plans to introduce legislation next year to expand the tax holiday to include laptops and textbooks. The tax-free period should also be expanded to two weekends, Ward Johnson said.
The legislation would receive bipartisan support among lawmakers in Austin looking to combat the high costs of living, she said.
“It’s more of a necessity,” Ward Johnson, a former elected Houston Community College Board member, said of electronic purchases. “It wasn’t back in 1999 when this bill was passed, but now technology is where everybody’s going.”
Texas Rep. Charlene Ward Johnson speaks during an HISD meeting at Waltrip High School in Houston on Wednesday, Jan. 7, 2026.
Elizabeth Conley/Houston Chronicle
But Fox, the tax policy analyst, questioned whether targeted tax holidays were better for consumers or states. The state will have to make up for the lost revenue eventually, and the tax holiday could force some consumers to compromise on quality, she said.
“It’s not a guarantee (of savings) because there is the possibility that stores could be inflating their prices to somewhat compensate for the change in consumer habits,” Fox said. “Would families be better off if retailers instead just gave a price reduction?”
The National Federation of Independent Business has touted the tax holiday as an “excellent opportunity” to invest in small businesses, but Fox said the temporary change in tax code could disproportionately harm smaller stores.
Small businesses, for example, are often less equipped to handle the extra administrative burden of removing sales tax on certain items, especially for online purchases, she said.
The savings may be small, but are still meaningful, argued Ward Johnson. “Any pennies or dollars that a family can save during that weekend, it’s money that they can use for other necessities,” she said, likening the practice to cutting coupons. “Even though to some people it may not seem a lot, to people that are struggling and that are living paycheck to paycheck, every saving that they can get is important.”