Monday Tipsheet: Target’s Nervous Suppliers | Whistleblower Hits Lowe’s | Tome Joins Nonprofit

 

Walmart’s Management Changes Indicate Important New Direction for U.S Stores by Walter Loeb at Forbes. “Greg Foran and Judith McKenna have decided to eliminate the executive level which supervised Walmart East and Walmart West. Julie Murphy’s position will not be filled and Joaquin Gonzales Varela, EVP of Walmart East has left the company. The whole U.S. operation now reports directly to Judith McKenna.” Read more

 

Suppliers wonder how they fit in with Target’s new priorities by Kavita Kumar at Star-Tribune. “Those in the “perform” category are probably most in danger of being replaced by one of Target’s private-label brands, said Amy Koo, another Kantar analyst. “And if you are in the reposition category, you need to figure out a way to get out of that box,” she said. “That is a frightening place to be.” Read more

 

Home Depot’s Carol Tome Joins Exclusive Atlanta Nonprofit at Atlanta Business Chronicle.  Read more

 

Lumber Liquidator Whistleblower Goes After Lowe’s at Seeking Alpha. “…Shortly thereafter I received two audio recordings of conversations from Larry who had attended the Domotex conference. These two conversations provided enough evidence for me to dig further at Lowe’s. The factory representatives where Lowe’s sourced its products indicated that Lowe’s had been purchasing similar non-compliant HDF cores as Lumber Liquidators.” Read more

 

Family Dollar deal could close this month, bring big changes by Katherine Peralta at Charlotte Observer. “One former Family Dollar corporate employee said that, for the most part, the “urgent exodus” from the headquarters is over. Another former corporate employee said Family Dollar has offered retention bonuses in an effort to keep key employees, though other Matthews workers still anticipate layoffs.” Read more

 

***A message from Mobee: Are you out of stock in Roanoke, VA? Mobee has over 350,000 GPS Tracked, Smartphone enabled “Bees” located within 5 miles of every retail store in the USA. We detect supply chain issues quickly and issue fix alerts to remedy the problem in hours not months. Our “Supply Chain Fix Alerts” have resulted in post-alert sales increases of up to +35% by getting displays up and product on shelf.  How Mobee works videoSee “Fix Alert” example.  Visit websiteContact dowdy@getmobee.com to ask about our “Free Pilot” offer.

 

Hitt to succeed Tovar as Walmart’s VP of communications by Diana Bradley at PR Week.  Read more

 

NY Times: The Uphill Battle to Better Regulate Formaldehyde by Eric Lipton & Rachel Abrams “An unusual assortment of players, including furniture makers, the Chinese government, Republicans from states with a large base of furniture manufacturing and even some Democrats who championed early regulatory efforts, have questioned the E.P.A. proposal. The sustained opposition has held sway, as the agency is now preparing to ease key testing requirements before it releases the landmark federal health standard.” Read more

 

Jet.com First Look: Prices Are Fantastic but Amazon Prime Shoppers Won’t Switch Over by Jason Del Rey at Recode. Read more

 

Growing Shipping Alliances are Straining Major U.S. Gateway Ports by Costas Paris at WSJ. “Container shipping, which moves over 95% of the world’s manufactured goods, is largely controlled by around 15 mostly European and Asian operators, which recently have accelerated the pooling of operations within giant alliances to cut costs. Long a feature of maritime shipping, the alliances have grown in recent years as carriers have introduced bigger vessels that are least twice the size of those calling on U.S. ports for years.” Read more (Subscription)

 

Home Depot Executive VP Honored at The Marietta Daily Journal. “The Georgia Justice Project honored Teresa Wynn Roseborough, executive vice president, general counsel and corporate secretary for Vinings-based The Home Depot, with its 2015 Grass Roots Justice Award. The award was presented by Frank Blake, former chairman and CEO of The Home Depot.” Read more

 

Amazon alums meld art and science of cooking at The Seattle Times. “The Meld Knob and Clip work together with a cellphone app. The knob is controlled by the temperature-sensing clip placed in a pot on the stove top. The user selects a recipe from the app, or manually selects a temperature, and the phone will use information from the clip to tell the knob what to do.” Read more

 

***

Eye-on-Retail Tipsheet is created early every weekday morning and read by retail merchants and executives worldwide. We love data, earnings reports, executive presentations and stories off the beaten path that get at what’s really happening in the world of retail. Contact us at info@shiftmarketinggroup.net.