Luxe buyer not who you may think by Krystina Gustafson at CNBC. "57.5 percent of luxury spenders are actually male, and many are of Asian and Middle Eastern descent...The report, which examined 30,000 high-end shoppers, found that luxury brands lose 50 percent of their top customers each year by not correctly identifying them." Read more   Study: In-store pickup does not save U.S. shoppers much time by Deepa Seetharaman at Reuters. "According to a small study to be released on Tuesday by retail-intelligence firm StellaService, in-store pickup saved shoppers just 96 seconds on average compared with searching for items on their [...]

  Online Retailers Rebound After Last Year’s Christmas Delivery Debacle by Jason Del Rey at Recode. "Shoppers hired by StellaService placed 160 orders on the last possible day an order could be placed to make it in time for Christmas and found that eleven of those orders didn’t arrive on time, for a seven percent miss rate. But that’s still better than last year, when 12 percent of orders didn’t arrive on time." Read more   Behind the $3.8B loss retailers expect by Herb Weisbaum at CNBC. "One of the biggest challenges continues to be "wardrobing"—the return of a used [...]

  Walgreen Q1 Front-End Comp +1.5% "First quarter sales increased 6.7 percent compared with the prior-year quarter to a record $19.6 billion, with total sales in comparable stores increasing 5.7 percent...customer traffic in comparable stores decreased 2.7 percent, basket size increased 4.2 percent." Read the release   Canada: Walmart stores busy, Target stores, not so much by Francine Kopun at Toronto Star. "A snapshot of 76 stores across Canada, conducted the weekend of Dec. 13-14, found that 30 out of 38 Walmart stores were busy or very busy. Among 38 Target stores, 15 locations were busy or very busy." Read more [...]

  Retailers' holiday hopes rise after busy weekend by Jayne O'Donnell at USA Today. "Shopping at a Target in Milford, Mass., Tony Faath says "the store was mobbed," but clerks were doing their best to keep lines moving. And, unlike Black Friday, there were no crazed rushes to deals, shelves weren't bare and "the shoppers seemed to be in good spirits," says Faath." Read more   Indian E-Commerce is On Fire. What Will Amazon and Alibaba Do About It? by Jason Del Rey at Recode. "On Saturday, Flipkart — perhaps the most popular online shopping site in India — announced [...]

  Costco reports federal probe about prescriptions for controlled substances by Angel Gonzalez at Seattle Times. "Costco said Thursday it has been informed by federal attorneys that they believe the company has violated civil regulations about the handling of prescriptions for controlled substances." Read more   Amazon offers one-hour shipping in Manhattan at AP via SF Gate. "The service is available to customers enrolled in Amazon Prime, which costs $99 a year. One-hour delivery costs $7.99 but the company also offers two-hour delivery for free. Prime Now is available from 6 a.m. to midnight, seven days a week." Read more [...]

  Target CEO announces leadership promotions by Nick Halter at Minn./St. Paul Business Journal. "Omnichannel president and senior vice president Casey Carl moved into the leadership team, reporting to Cornell as chief strategy and innovation officer. Jason Goldberger has been named president of Target.com and mobile. Chief Marketing Officer Jeff Jones will take on added responsibilities, including enhancing the guest experience through a new "guest center of excellence" Read more   Retail watchers say Nook would be a good fit for Wal-Mart by Kim Souza at The City Wire. "You need go no further than Wal-Mart's own book section on their website [...]

  Where Christmas is Most Loved in U.S. by Eric Chemi at CNBC. "Look at the states dominating the top of the list: Georgia, Tennessee, Florida, Arkansas, South Carolina, Texas, Mississippi and North Carolina are all up there. These are all Republican-voting strongholds, home to a dominant Christian citizenship." Read more   Most-searched places on Google Maps in 2014 (Walmart #1, Home Depot #5, Costco #10) by Ben Abramson at USA Today. See the Top 10 List   WSJ: Sears Bets Big on Technology, but at the Expense of Its Stores by Suzanne Kapner. "...in the four years it was [...]

  Google Shopping to Counter Amazon by Rolfe Winkler & Alistair Barr at WSJ. "Google has approached retailers about creating a “buy” button for its online shopping site that would be similar to Amazon’s popular “one-click ordering” feature, according to people familiar with the discussions. Until now, Google Shopping has referred shoppers to merchants’ websites via links in search results. But Google wants to keep users on its own pages longer, rather than send them elsewhere." Read more (Subscription)   Sears CEO Lampert explains why he closed 200 stores by Phil Wahba at Fortune. "“Most of these stores were losing [...]