And so it might come as a surprise that the retail industry overall actually rang up solid sales. The National Retail Federation said Friday that retailers had a healthy 4 percent increase, with a total haul of $658.3 billion. That’s better than the 3.6 percent the trade group had forecast and a significant improvement over the 3 percent growth recorded last year.

It’s a striking incongruity: The industry is faring well, while some of its most recognizable names are not. And it is indicative of a retailing landscape that increasingly is sorting into winners and losers, in which consumers’ bolstered confidence is translating into big spending in some corners of the mall and the Internet, and not so much in others.

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Many forecasters noted that retailers had quite a few tailwinds this time around for their busy season. Wages have risen, and consumer confidence shot up after the presidential election, factors that often make shoppers more willing to splurge. Meanwhile, Thanksgiving came early this year, and Hanukkah was late, giving stores more time to court gift buyers. Even the weather largely worked in retailers’ favor: There were not many major snowstorms that kept shoppers and delivery trucks off the roads, yet it was cold enough to put people in a Christmas frame of mind.

All of these factors probably contributed to the industry’s sales increases this season. E-commerce, too, was a particularly strong driver of growth. NRF reports that “non-store sales,” which includes online and catalogue purchases, were up 12.6 percent, compared with 2015.

So if shoppers were shifting their money away from the likes of Macy’s during the holiday season, where were they spending it? In many cases, they were probably turning to upstart retailers with a more boutique-type vibe, such as Bonobos, Warby Parker, Marine Layer or Cuyana. Small and midsize retailers have stolen away about $200 billion in annual sales from retailing behemoths over the past five years, according to consultancy Deloitte.

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And in some cases, those shoppers might be headed to Amazon.com. Researchers at Slice Intelligence say that the e-commerce giant snatched up about 38 percent of all online shopping dollars during the holiday season, a share that no other retailer came anywhere close to matching. (Jeffrey P. Bezos, the chief executive of Amazon, owns The Washington Post.)