MAGA Merch Sales Collapse as Sellers Close Stores and Cut Prices

By Grace Kim

Sales of Trump-branded merchandise have fallen 39% from their 2024 peak at Richard Kligman's Trump Super Store in Myrtle Beach, South Carolina, and he wants out before the market gets worse. "You have to read the writing on the wall that as we go into '27, it's definitely going to fall off, and I'd like to be out of it as much as I could be by the end of '27," Kligman told Fortune.

Kligman didn't plan on selling MAGA gear. In 2016, customers at the kite shop he ran with his brother kept asking for Trump hats and flags, so the pair opened a dedicated Trump Super Store in the empty storefront next door in 2018. "You'd have thought I was selling crack," he joked. Between the 2020 and 2024 elections, sales were "going gangbusters," with the brothers working seven days a week to keep up.

Now the demand is fading, and Kligman sees a structural reason. "A lot of the Trump merchandise stores across the country are closing because they see that things are going to change a bit, and the demand is not what it once was," he said. "It's absolutely gone down, but it had to because he can't run again."

How big is the drop?

Amazon sellers reported an estimated $140 million in Trump-themed merchandise sales from April through September 2024, according to e-commerce marketing platform Omnisend. That was the high-water mark.

The decline since then shows up across every layer of the business:

• Steven Slaton, co-owner of the Trumped Store and Coffee Shop in Show Low, Arizona, estimated September sales were down 20% to 25% from the same month in 2024. He and his wife Karen are marking down $30 hats and shirts to $10.
• Fortune found at least three independent Trump merch stores closed this year — in Connecticut, Pennsylvania, and Tennessee — including one that once made 350 sales a day at an average of $60 each.
• Eric Turney, sales director at manufacturer The Monterey Company, said the firm earned roughly $250,000 in 2024 making MAGA hats, keychains, and buttons for nine wholesalers. It now serves three, and order volume collapsed from an average of 15 per month in 2024 to just 13 total from 2025 to this year.
• Google searches for "MAGA hat" are down 95% as of October from their peaks in December 2018 and November 2024, per Google Trends.

"Once he went into office, [demand] really dropped off the face of the cliff," Turney said.

Why are buyers pulling back?

Part of it is the calendar. Ronald Solomon, president of wholesaler and retailer The MAGA Mall, said his MAGA product sales in recent months are down 34% from 2024 — but he expected that. "There's no way I expected it to be as brisk as a presidential year," he said of the 2026 midterm cycle.

Part of it is household budgets. Slaton said customers have less to spend as food, housing, and gas prices strain their wallets. A Fox News poll from Oct. 14 found 77% of registered voters disapproved of Trump's handling of inflation and 70% disapproved of his handling of the economy. His overall approval rating fell to 36% — the lowest Fox News has recorded across either of his two presidencies.

"It's like everybody took a big, deep breath and then everybody's looking for a new type of gear," Slaton said.

What's keeping sellers afloat?

Rallies. Trump's appearances for Republican midterm candidates have revived demand, at least temporarily. Solomon recalled selling "a tremendous amount" of MAGA and Trump 2028 hats at a rally in Vandalia, Ohio. "During the summer, the MAGA stuff wasn't selling as much, but now all of a sudden it's selling a lot again," he said. The Trump Organization itself started selling $50 "Trump 2028" hats in April 2025.

The clearest sign of the strategic shift is Sany Dash. She said she has sold $63 million in Trump merch over nine years — and this year she closed all three of her USA Trump Stores, two in Texas (Gainesville and Arlington) and one in Loveland, Colorado, because revenue fell so far. She may open one location in Dallas, but she'll focus on patriotic-themed jewelry and clothing at rallies and political events, where she estimates 40% to 50% of attendees buy merch.

"The stores are not doing well, but the rallies are doing incredibly good," Dash said. "We have to look at, logistically, where we're going to open up our new store, and it may not say Trump — it may just say 'patriotic merch,' I don't know yet."

What happens after Trump?

With the Constitution barring Trump from another presidential run, sellers are already planning for a post-MAGA business. Dash doubts the brand survives him. "After Trump is gone, I don't see MAGA continue because Trump is the face of MAGA," she said.

Slaton is hedging the same way. He said the Trumped Store might rebrand around whoever leads the next Republican ticket. "We're telling people we'll probably transition over to JD Vance or Marco [Rubio] or whomever the prospective nominee is going to be," he said. "We'll have to figure out how we're going to do that."

The takeaway: a merch economy built around one candidate's campaigns is winding down on schedule, and the sellers who moved fastest — toward rallies, patriotic branding, and the 2028 field — are the ones still booking sales.