Archive for month: March, 2014

 

“Rumor Has It…Second Walmart to Go Store Being Prepped in Orlando, FL” by Kim Souza at City Wire. “The new Walmart to Go convenience store opened recently in Bentonville is not the retailer’s first experiment with the small-store format. Wal-Mart historians and former corporate officers told The City Wire that the first convenience store for the company was located in Springdale in the 1990s.”  Read more

 

“Brazil:  5,000 people line up for 7 hours for $4 tank tops” by Loretta Chao at WSJ.  “Low-priced fashion retailer Forever 21 Inc. opened its first store in Brazil this past weekend, causing a stir among the country’s price-sensitive shoppers who lined up for seven hours to buy $4 tank tops and other trendy items priced far below competitors.  Shoppers flocked to Morumbi, one of São Paulo’s largest shopping malls, where the store opened to lines reaching more than 5,000 people Saturday.”  Read more

 

“Dollar General:  Cigs Have Increased Avg. Transaction by 28%” at Motley Fool.  “When Dollar General first introduced tobacco products in the second quarter of 2013, roughly one-third of cigarette sales involved no other product, one-third included a single other item (a “smoke and Coke”), and the final third was part of a larger basket.  Fast-forward to today, and only 26% of cigarette sales don’t include at least one other item. More important, 44% now fall into the third and most lucrative category.”  Read more

 

“Home Depot’s ‘Store for One’ Could be First of Many; Pinewood Studios Store to Open April 3rd” by Leon Stafford at AJC.  “(Home Depot) has built a 45,000-square-foot store dedicated solely to Pinewood Studios, the British filmmaker behind James Bond and the Harry Potter series, and its associates. “It’s a new venture for us,” said J.T. Rieves, vice president of pro business for the retailer. “What they (Pinewood Studios) are trying to do is to create a level of control of predictability for someone who wants to make a movie.”  Read more

 

“Walmart Looking to Sell Large Home Appliances?” by Kim Souza at City Wire.  “Wal-Mart already has the supplier relationships with top appliance brands through Sam’s Club. Given its buying power, Spieckerman said Wal-Mart could negotiate competitive prices against Home Depot, Lowe’s Home Improvement and Sears — the major players in kitchen appliance sales.  There are also add-on service fees for home delivery and set-up which could pad overall margins in this category. As more Millennials seek to set up new households, it would also be an opportunity to cater to those needs.”  Read more

 

“Costco teaches Grandville (MI) students about real-life budgeting” by Kyle Moroney at MLive.  “The Grandville Costco store sells about $2 million worth of merchandise each week, and had $102 million in sales in 2013, according to Jones.  Students were shocked to learn the warehouse club retailer’s most popular sale item is its signature Kirkland brand toilet paper. The store sells nearly 56,200 packages of toilet paper each year, equating to more than 1.6 million toilet paper rolls.”  Read more

 

“Ralph Nader Really, Really Wants a Higher Minimum Wage (Quotes Craig Jelinek, Says Doug McMillon May Do “Right Thing”)”  at USA Today.  “Craig Jelinek, CEO of Costco Wholesale Corp., told me that he starts his workers at $11.50 an hour plus benefits because it results in “less turnover, more productive workers and it’s the right thing to do.” After two years of internal deliberation, Doug Mcmillon, Walmart’s new CEO, is also nearing a decision to do the right thing and abolish Walmart’s poverty wage regime.” Read more

 

“Costco closes in on second upstate NY location, is Albany next?” at Albany Business Review.  “The company, which already is planning to open a store in the Syracuse suburb of Camillus, reached an agreement to open another store in Rochester”  Read more

 

” ‘Ground’ broken on $325 million Mall of America expansion” by Janet Moore at Star-Tribune.  “On Tuesday, that retail guessing game concluded once and for all, with mall officials announcing a luxury 342-room JW Marriott hotel, an office tower and more than 50 shops and restaurants aimed for an unassuming concrete patch on the Bloomington behemoth’s northern flank.  The new $325 million iteration of the nation’s biggest shopping mall and one of the country’s top tourist destinations is expected to debut in August 2015.”  Read more

 

Happening Today:  Retailers Present at ISI 4th Annual Retail Summit:

Walmart @ 11:00 am ET   Webcast

Lowe’s @ 11:35 am ET   Webcast

Home Depot @ 12:30 pm ET  Webcast

 

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“Wal-Mart opens first Walmart to Go convenience store” by Kim Souza at The City Wire.  “It’s been more than a year of planning, but the Walmart to Go convenience-store format quietly opened in Bentonville on Saturday (March 15), with the grand opening set for March 19.”  See eight pictures / Read more

 

“Home Depot goes into the movie business, will open 1st private store at movie studio” by Ellie Hensley at Atlanta Bus. Chronicle.  “(Home Depot) will open a first-of-its-kind private Home Depot store on the lot of the new Pinewood Atlanta Studios. The store will be closed to the public and exclusively for the use of film, TV and video production crews.  Home Depot at Pinewood will sell only items used to build production sets, including lumber, nails, doors, windows and other “expendables” that crews will tear down.”  Read more (subscription required)

 

@marinastrauss (Globe & Mail, Canada) “New Tar-zhay store at Stockyards in TO busy this aft, shelves stocked better”  See the Tweet

 

“Dallas Grocery War:  Turf Battles Likely to Lower Prices” by Maria Halkias at Dallas Star.  “This month, Kroger said it lowered prices on thousands of food and household items….Kroger currently serves 662,000 households every week in the North Texas market with 86 locations, and we continue to expand those numbers,” said Bill Breetz, Kroger Southwest president. “We know that price is important to every customer and at times can be a deciding factor where to shop.”  Read more

 

“Target warns data breach could be worse than reported so far” at Reuters.  “Our investigation of the matter is ongoing and it is possible that we will identify additional information that was accessed or stolen, which could materially worsen the losses and reputational damage we have experienced,” the company said in its 10-K annual report filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission on Friday.”  Read more

 

“Inside Home Depot’s Utah Call Center (Orange Aprons Still Required)” by Jesus Lopez Jr. at Standard-Examiner.  “Orange aprons are still prevalent, and there are walls splashed with Home Deport orange, but instead of the lumber and tools, there is the sound of keyboards clicking and the buzz of phone conversations. “I love the little nuances,” the center’s director Dawn Colwell said. “The orange paint and all that, it feels like Home Depot.”  Read more

 

“Say goodbye to your supermarket” by Dan Mitchell at Fortune.  “The fact that Cerberus made a play for Harris Teeter before Kroger snapped it up is an indication that it wants to pursue a strategy similar to its bigger competitor: playing both ends of a rapidly splitting market.  Whether either company will succeed this way is still open to question. What’s beyond a doubt is that steering a middle course is bound to end in a tragic crash.”  Read more

 

“Lowe’s Hunts for New CIO” by Rachel King at WSJ.  “Lowe’s Cos. is looking for a new CIO. Kevin Summers, former CIO, left the home improvement retailer at the end of February. Paul Ramsay, the company’s senior vice president of information technology, has been named acting CIO.  The company will look both internally and externally to fill the position and Mr. Ramsay will be one of the candidates considered, said Lowe’s spokesperson Connie Bryant Breedlove.”  Read more

 

“New Amazon Prime fee makes shoppers do the math” by Kelli Grant at CNBC.  “Amazon has a complex system of shipping fees that vary by category and number of items per order, with two-day shipping rates starting at $5.99 to $12.49 per shipment. By that measure, at $79 a year, Prime paid off in as few as seven single-item orders or as many as 14. After the price hike, it will take eight to 17.”  Read more

 

“Sears to Spin Off Lands’ End” by Robert Channick at Chicago Tribune.  “Clothing retailer Lands’ End is set to spin off from Sears Holdings Corp. on April 4, according to an amended filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission.”  Read more

 

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“Breaking:  Dollar General Same-Store Sales +1.3% in Q4, +3.3% for Year”  “We successfully opened 650 new stores, ending the year with 11,132 stores serving customers in 40 states…Net sales increased 6.8 percent to $4.49 billion in the 2013 fourth quarter…Same-store sales increases were driven by sales of tobacco products and perishables.”  Read the release

 

“How Target Blew It:  Missed Alarms and 40 Million Stolen Credit Card Numbers” at Bloomberg.  “For some reason, Minneapolis didn’t react to the sirens. Bloomberg Businessweek spoke to more than 10 former Target employees familiar with the company’s data security operation, as well as eight people with specific knowledge of the hack and its aftermath, including former employees, security researchers, and law enforcement officials. The story they tell is of an alert system, installed to protect the bond between retailer and customer, that worked beautifully. But then, Target stood by as 40 million credit card numbers—and 70 million addresses, phone numbers, and other pieces of personal information—gushed out of its mainframes.”  Read more

 

Home Depot CEO Frank Blake Appears on CNBC (in Las Vegas at Store Manager’s Walk):

…on Spring:  “we need Spring to come”  See the video

…on online plans and supporting internet taxes.  See the video

 

Trending Online:  ‘Target’s Latest Photoshop Fail Looks Pretty Painful” by Jamie Feldman at Huff Po.  “Why, Target? WHY? Photoshop fails have become more common than ever, with various retailers chopping off limbs and backsides. So it’s really no surprise that Target is the most recent culprit to distort a model.”  Read more

 

“Target Apologizes for Anatomically Impossible ‘Thigh Gap’ Photo” at Time.  “It was an unfortunate error on our part and we apologize,” Target spokesman Evan Miller said to ABC News, adding that the photo had been removed from Target’s website.” Read more

 

“Obama Goes Shopping at Gap in NY (Michelle Doesn’t Like Hoodies) at NY Post. “Panariello recommended a hoodie for the First Lady, but the president said she doesn’t like them…“He did ask how long I’d been there and asked another worker and talked about the minimum-wage increase,’’ Panariello said.  Gap told its employees late last month that it would raise its minimum wage to $9 an hour, later increasing to $10 an hour.” Read more

 

“Happening Today:  Lowe’s CEO & CFO Present at UBS Conference @10:30 am ET”  Follow the Webcast

 

“Whole Foods CEO not concerned with traditional grocers ‘we are not them, and they are not us’ “ by Elliot Zwiebach at Supermarket News.  “(Walter) Robb mentioned two initiatives that will help distinguish Whole Foods from its competition: “Customers have never had any view into the use of pesticides on conventional produce, and we’re going to provide that for them for the first time ever. And we also plan an effort around transparency on GMO labeling.”  Read more

 

“Best Buy to Start Selling Elon Musk’s Solar Panels in 60 Stores” by Carolyn Said & Thomas Lee at SF Gate.  “SolarCity offers free solar installations and then sells power to customers at typically 10 to 15 percent less than utilities’ prices. The company said it recoups the cost of installation plus generates a profit over the long term by offering 20-year power contracts.  SolarCity boasts a similar partnership with Home Depot stores. “We’re in the process of doubling our investment in that channel,” Bass said.” Read more

 

“Canada:  Supermarkets Squeeze Suppliers for More” by Marina Strauss at Globe & Mail.  “About a month after the $5.8-billion acquisition closed, Sobeys demanded its suppliers provide it with 1-per-cent retroactive “synergy savings” – or price cuts – and no price increases in 2014…Last week, Overwaitea Food Group made its own demands. In a letter to suppliers dated March 3, it implemented a “new store startup fee” of one free case of all listed items per new store, including “all new stores going forward in each banner.”  Read more

 

“What Nordstrom can learn from Target’s Canadian experiment” by Krystina Gustafson at CNBC.  “I think one of the things about Canada is that in the U.S., we tend to treat them like our next-door neighbor and like they’re an extension of our economy, and that’s really not fair,” Paul said. “What a lot of retailers are learning is that Canada can be just as challenging as going halfway around the world.”  Read more

 

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“Target CMO Jeff Jones Navigates Marketing Post-Security Breach” by Natalie Zmuda at Ad Age.  “Though the breach will eventually cease to be top-of-mind for consumers, it’s a given that media reports will drag it back into consumers’ consciousness as the holiday season approaches. “We’re in the early days of planning for that,” Mr. Jones said.”  Read more

 

“What 10 Brands’ Terrible Websites Looked Like On The Day They Launched In The 1990s (Walmart’s Greeter & Home Depot’s Homer on the home page!)” at Business Insider.  See the Top 10 Then & Now Pictures

 

“McAfee Describes Target Hack as a Breach 101 Operation” by Jennifer Bjorhus at Star-Tribune.  “The thieves used easily modified off-the-shelf malware, common methods to hide the malware inside Target’s point of sale system and didn’t encrypt either the instructions on where to send the stolen card data or the card information itself…“It’s all just there in black and white,” said Jim Walter, manager of McAfee’s Threat Intelligence Service. “As an attack, it is extremely unimpressive and unremarkable.” Read more

 

“McAfee Labs Threat Report Q4 2013”  Read the report

 

“Swatch sues Target, claims it copied watch designs” by Jonathan Stempel at Reuters via Chicago Tribune.  “In a lawsuit made public on Monday in U.S. District Court in Manhattan, Swatch, which is known for its plastic namesake watches, accused Target of infringing its designs for “zebra” and “multi-color” watches.  Swatch said the quality of Target’s watches is “inferior” to its own, and that their continued sale is likely to confuse shoppers and damage the Swiss company’s sales.”  Read more

 

“3 Reasons Why Dick’s Sporting Goods Isn’t Dying” by Brian Sozzi at The Street.  “The competition between Nike and Under Armour at Dick’s is sparking innovation for both brands, while cutting down its fitness equipment section and adding wearable device shops will keep Dick’s from going to the retail grave.”  See the video / Read more

 

“CVS Could Face $29 Million Fine for Losing Painkillers” by David Lazarus at LA Times.  “Officials at the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration and the California Board of Pharmacy told me Monday that more than 37,000 pills were apparently taken from (California) CVS stores in Modesto, Fairfield, Dixon and Turlock…CVS faces 2,973 possible violations of the federal Controlled Substances Act for alleged discrepancies between the company’s records and its inventory of prescription drugs.”  Read more

 

“For Shopify Merchants, Facebook is King in Driving Sales” by Alice Truong at Fast Company.  “For Shopify, a platform that makes it easy for stores to set up online shops, Facebook is king. The social network drives 63% of social media visits to Shopify’s 90,000 stores, according to a report released Monday by the e-commerce company.”  See the Infographics / Read more

 

“Home Depot’s Marvin Ellison Joins FedEx Board of Directors”  “Prior to joining The Home Depot, Mr. Ellison spent 15 years at Target Corporation in a variety of operational roles. Mr. Ellison is also a director of H&R Block.”  Read the release

 

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