Archive for month: October, 2023

 

Pharmacy staff from CVS, Walgreens stores in US start three-day walkout at Reuters. “The walkout, which has been dubbed “Pharmageddon” on social media platforms such as Meta’s Facebook where it was largely planned, started on Monday and led to the closing of some stores in New York City, two organizers told Reuters.” Read more

 

100 Best Large Workplaces for Women at Fortune

• Wegmans #22
• Publix #69

 

Walmart Celebrates Re-Grand Opening of 117 Remodeled Stores Across U.S Press release

 

Home Improvement Retailers Amp Up Radio Presence at Inside Radio. “Lowe’s leaps 13 positions up the weekly spot count tally to reach No. 1 for the first time this year. Lowe’s doubled its spot load to 52,166 occurrences for the week of Oct. 23-29. That’s 17,000 more than the Home Depot ran, even as it advances 8-6.” Read more/Top 10 list

 

60 entrepreneurs get ‘golden ticket’ to do business with Walmart at Talk Business. “Walmart and Sam’s Club merchant teams handed out 60 golden tickets for a deal by 5 p.m. from almost 1,000 meetings held between two corporate locations and virtually. A few companies got two golden tickets for separate products they pitched.” Read more

 

Eyedrops from CVS, Rite Aid and others carry possible infection risk, FDA says at Boston Globe/AP. Read more

 

Ahold Delhaize Makes Major Grocery Acquisition in Europe at Progressive Grocer. “Ahold Delhaize has agreed to acquire 100% of Romanian grocery retailer Profi Rom Food SRL from MidEuropa for an enterprise value of approximately €1.3 billion (almost USD $1.4 billion).” Read more

 

BJ’s Wholesale Club to give free Thanksgiving turkeys to members at Supermarket News. “From Nov. 1 through Nov. 9, BJ’s members will be eligible to receive a digital coupon for a free fresh or frozen whole turkey when they spend $150 in the same transaction, in-club or online.” Read more

 

…BJ’s enters its 20th state as it continues to expand in the Southeast at Progressive Grocer. “…will open its first club location in Alabama on Nov. 10. The new club, located at 165 Graphics Drive in Madison, is part of the mixed-use development called Town Madison and just minutes from Toyota Field.” Read more

 

Zulily moves into new Seattle office following ownership change and more layoffs at GeekWire. “The e-commerce retailer recently moved into a new space at the 95 Jackson building in Seattle’s Pioneer Square neighborhood. GeekWire visited the new office last week. The space had office furniture and desks, but there were only a handful of employees.” Read more

 

Sprouts Farmers Market Reports Q3 2023 Results – Comparable store sales growth of 3.9% Press release

 

Jury convicts man in arson attack on Target headquarters after false rumor of a police killing at Star Tribune. “That same night, Edwards and Jackson stole designer purses and other items from Saks Off Fifth on Nicollet Mall, and Edwards texted acquaintances telling them about the purses. When one of the acquaintances asked why he was downtown, Edwards replied, “Lootin.” Read more

 

Americans are still putting way too much food into landfills at AP. “More than one-third of the food produced in the U.S. is never eaten…That’s why more than 50 local officials signed onto a letter Tuesday calling on the Environmental Protection Agency to help municipal governments cut food waste in their communities.” Read more

 

Amazon tests letting warehouse workers listen to music and other audio via Bluetooth earplugs at GeekWire. Read more

 

There’s an easy way cities can lure in more holiday shoppers: Get rid of street parking at Business Insider. “The study notes that shop owners often oppose removing street parking around them because they’re “afraid of deteriorated accessibility, declining pedestrian frequencies, and lower revenue.” But the researchers, who looked at rent for retail spaces in the city center of Aachen, Germany between 2015 and 2022, found that those fears are largely unfounded.” Read more

 

Goodwill evacuated after live ‘cluster bomblet’ found among donations at NY Post. “Employees of the thrift store in the city of Janesville outside Madison made the startling discovery Friday morning while inventorying donated items, prompting the evacuation of an entire city block for more than two and a half hours while authorities investigated, police said.” Read more

 

A first-hand look at Amazon’s new ‘Sequoia’ warehouse robotic system at GeekWire. “We got a first-hand look and a guided tour of the new robotic system with Rain Wang, an Amazon senior technical product manager who leads the Sequoia project, during a tour at Amazon’s “Delivering the Future” event in Sumner. Later, we sat down to discuss the details with Scott Dresser, Amazon Robotics vice president.” Read more/Video

 

Ex-Amazon manager writes tell-all memoir about working while female at Seattle Times. “It’s a place, as she describes it, where no feedback is good feedback, “where you never feel like you’re really nailing it,” and where the frantic quest to prove yourself “nearly superhuman” — a criteria for becoming an executive — exacts a punishing toll. It’s also a place where she occupied rooms filled mostly with men and where she kept trying to convince the few women in her orbit, typically brilliant and self-flagellating, that they were not about to be fired.” Read more

 

How ‘household restocking’ startup The Rounds uses tech and AI to make sustainable e-commerce profitable at TechCrunch. “Launched in 2019 in Philadelphia, and now available in D.C., Miami and Atlanta, The Rounds allows customers to shop from across 650 SKUs, up from 150 just a year ago…At present, the service has north of 10,000 paying subscribers — a figure that could be impacted by the service’s price. “It is not the cheapest,” Torrey admits.” Read more

 

Moosejaw’s 1st Utah location opens as chain’s other nationwide stores prepare to close at KSL TV 5. “Dick’s Sporting Goods acquired the company earlier this year. Then, last month, it decided it would shutter most of Moosejaw’s nationwide locations…Moosejaw’s Salt Lake City location, which officially opened on Thursday, is one of three that will remain open in the future, joining a store in Bentonville, Arkansas, and another in Birmingham, Michigan.” Read more

 

Amazon Confronts a New Rival: TikTok at WSJ. “TikTok launched its shopping feature, called TikTok Shop, last month and is currently selling about $7 million worth of products like hairbrushes, teeth-whitening tools and fall-themed sweatshirts with leaves and pumpkins every day in the U.S., with a goal of reaching $10 million a day by the end of the year, according to people familiar with the matter…TikTok is spending heavily to build a logistics operation, poaching Amazon employees and trying to lure third-party sellers by offering them a bigger cut of sales than Amazon, according to sellers.” WSJ subs. 

 

Amazon, Microsoft, and India crack down on tech support scams at The Verge. “Call center operators use pop-ups, malware, and cold calls to get people to pay for PC ‘fixes’ they don’t really need.” Read more

 

Costco shopper says he cracked secret to wholesaler’s price tags and mysterious asterisk at Fox Business. “Prices that end in “.99” are considered to be a full price or regularly priced item. Anything ending in a “.97” is counted as a “store manager deal.” “It’s exclusive to that store and it’s probably not gonna last long,” the TikToker continued. Prices ending in “.49” and “.79″ have the same meaning — a manufacturer special offer.” Read more/Video

 

Amazon considers offering veterinary telehealth at CNBC. “Amazon could turn to Pawp to fuel a potential pet telehealth offering in time for the holiday season because Pawp has already proven it can scale with a large retailer. Amazon could also partner with one of the dozens of other pet telehealth startups on the market or build its own practice, which is what Chewy did when it began offering the service during the Covid pandemic.” Read more

 

Why Ulta Beauty is piloting in-store sampling machines at Ad Age. “Ulta Beauty is partnering with SOS, a startup that provides digital vending machines of health and wellness products, for a pilot program. The six-month deal includes the installation of SOS machines doling out samples in 10 Ulta locations in New York, Massachusetts, Florida, California and Texas.” Ad Age subs. 

 

Temu’s Win Over Shein in the US Is Hurting Its Bottom Line at Bloomberg. “Sales last month were more than double Shein’s in the nation. Both firms face growing ESG scrutiny, geopolitical headwinds.” Bloomberg subs. 

 

Walmart teams with Chris Stapleton for “Heroes & Headliners” celebrity concert “On Nov. 11, Veterans Day, Walmart is celebrating the military community with a star-studded concert for veterans and their families. The first Heroes & Headliners concert features musical acts Chris Stapleton, H.E.R. and Imagine Dragons with Rob Gronkowski and Camille Kostek serving as emcees.” Press release

 

Halloween chocolate is pricier this year as El Niño hits cacao bean crop at CNBC. “Cocoa futures surged to $3,786 per metric ton on Monday, the highest since 1979…The price of candy in September was 7.5 percent higher than a year ago, according to the most recent consumer price index.” Read more

 

 

 

Retail sales rose 0.7% in September, much stronger than estimate at CNBC. “…well above the 0.3% Dow Jones estimate. Excluding autos, sales were up 0.6%, also well ahead of the forecast for just 0.2%.” Read more

 

Amazon, Expedia, Glassdoor, and others form coalition to fight fake reviews at GeekWire. “The new Coalition for Trusted Reviews was announced Tuesday morning by  Amazon, Booking.com, Expedia Group, Glassdoor, Tripadvisor, and Trustpilot. The companies say they “will define best practices for hosting online reviews and sharing methods of fake review detection, aiming to stop fake reviews at the source.” Read more

 

DoorDash’s Secret to Growth: Gamers Who Order Like They Are in Lockdown at WSJ. “DoorDash has shown up to gaming conferences, streamed battles between popular gamers and deployed ads with catchphrases such as “Stay in Your Game,” a straightforward way to remind players that every minute saved in acquiring food is another minute spent blasting the enemy to pixels. The result: Videogamers are now DoorDash’s fastest-growing pool of customers and among its most frequent users, the company says.” WSJ subs. 

 

Amazon quietly rolls out support for passkeys, with a catch at TechCrunch. “The option to set up a passkey is now available on the e-commerce giant’s website, allowing users to log in using biometric authentication on their device, such as their fingerprint or face scan.” Read more

 

Rite Aid seeks Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection at AP. “The company said Rite Aid stores will continue to fill prescriptions, and customers will still be able to visit its locations or shop online while it goes through its voluntary Chapter 11 process. But that process also will allow it to speed up its plan to close underperforming stores.” Read more

 

…Rite Aid Appoints Jeffrey S. Stein Chief Executive Officer Press release

 

Amazon partners with Petco in latest expansion of return drop-off footprint at GeekWire. “(Amazon) confirmed that it recently began testing a partnership with pet giant Petco, which will accept returns from customers who purchased items on Amazon.com.” Read more

 

Dollar General Might Get Shortchanged After CEO Encore at WSJ. “Less than a year after handing over the reins, Todd Vasos was reappointed chief executive officer of the struggling retailer. By the time of the announcement, its shares were down by nearly 59% so far in 2023. Vasos ran Dollar General from June 2015 until last November and had remained on its board.” WSJ subs.

 

Jeff Bezos buys $79M mansion in Florida’s exclusive ‘Billionaire Bunker’ at GeekWire. “Bloomberg reported that the seven bedroom, 14 bath estate is located in the exclusive Indian Creek area of Miami. The man-made barrier island is referred to as “Billionaire Bunker” and is home to notable residents including investor Carl Icahn, ex-NFL star Tom Brady, singer Julio Iglesias, and Ivanka Trump and Jared Kushner.” Read more

 

Brands hand out more free samples at Walmart as online ads lose appeal Ad Age subs. 

 

San Diego District Attorney meets with businesses to crack down on organized retail crimes at Fox 5. “Stephan met with ULTA Beauty loss prevention management and employees as she toured their San Marcos location…Stephan talked with two of the store’s managers, who said a majority of the store employees are female, and fearful about the attacks, which are getting more and more aggressive.” Read more

 

LVMH boss Bernard Arnault has just lost his spot as the world’s second-richest person to Jeff Bezos Fortune subs. 

 

Billionaire former Victoria’s Secret CEO pulls funding from Harvard, accusing the school of ‘dismal failure’ to take a stand for Israel at Business Insider. “In the absence of this clear moral stand, we have determined that the Harvard Kennedy School and The Wexner Foundation are no longer compatible partners,” the statement said. “Our core values and those of Harvard no longer align.” Read more

 

Consumers starting to buckle for first time in a decade, former Walmart U.S. CEO Bill Simon warns at CNBC. “They usually say 50-inch TV [is] $199 or something like that. And now, they say 50-inch TV [is] 40% off,” said Simon. “You use percentages when you’re not real proud of your price point. I think you’ve got inflation pushing the relative price points up.” Read more/Video

 

Walgreens pharmacy staff walk out, citing unsafe working conditions at Washington Post via MSN. “Thousands of Walgreens pharmacy staff across the country are walking off work this week, alleging that poor working conditions are putting employees and patients at risk. The walkout could impact hundreds of stores starting Monday and going through Wednesday, an organizer of the effort told The Washington Post…” Read more

 

Walmart Bets Online Doctors Will Lower Its $6 Billion Health Care Tab at Bloomberg. “Walmart Inc. will offer online primary care doctors to about 1 million people on its employee health insurance plan in an attempt to improve medical outcomes and lower costs. It will also be a big test of how much treatment can shift to the web.” Bloomberg subs. 

 

…Included Health Unveils New Virtual Primary Care Results Alongside Walmart Press release

 

Costco accused of sharing users’ health data with Meta at Seattle Times. “The lawsuit filed in Washington Western District Court alleges Costco used Meta Pixel, a code that allows companies to track visitor activity on their websites, in the health care portion of its website…“Advertisers should not send sensitive information about people through our business tools,” Meta said Monday. “Doing so is against our policies and we educate advertisers on properly setting up business tools to prevent this from occurring.” Costco is considered a Meta advertiser.” Read more

 

Nike reigns supreme among teen shoppers — here are the other brands they love the most at CNBC. “Amazon dominates as the online shopping site of choice. Shein comes up 2nd, but with just 7% of share compared to Amazon’s 59%. StockX and Temu moved into the top 10 after not making the list in the spring. Princess Polly and GOAT fell out of the top 10.” Read more

 

The big AI and robotics concept that has attracted both Walmart and Softbank at CNBC. “Symbotic’s stock is up near 190% this year, and Walmart owns 11% of its shares, as part of its deal to automate the retailer’s 42 U.S. regional distribution centers for packaged consumer goods.” Read more

 

Kroger Health pres. on bringing personalized healthcare to ‘new level’ at Yahoo Finance. “Kroger Health President Colleen Lindholz sat down with Yahoo Finance’s Anjalee Khemlani at the 2023 HLTH Conference to discuss the company’s retail pharmacies as well as the industry impact from weight-loss drugs. “We define ‘Food as Medicine’ as a dedicated, educated, and personalized approach to helping people enjoy food so they can live a healthier life and we can prevent disease before it starts,” Lindholz says.” Video & Transcript

 

Walmart’s former top woman executive reflects on her rise to the C-suite and hints at her next chapter at Fortune via Yahoo. “In a wide-ranging interview with Fortune, McKenna shared advice for women looking to chart a similar C-suite path…She credits Walmart for giving her assignments of increasing difficulty and outside her comfort zone, allowing her to prove her mettle. But she also notes the importance of taking ownership of one’s career. “I’ve been able to have these experiences, but I’ve had to take the leap into them as well,” she told Fortune a few weeks after stepping down.” Read more

 

Waffle House employees push for $25-an-hour wages and improved security at Atlanta Journal Constitution. “We’re rapidly growing because people see, ‘Oh, hey, there’s an actual effort to get a union going at Waffle House,’” Green said of the union, though the USSW does not plan to file a formal petition to unionize. A representative from USSW said that workers instead put “direct pressure” on companies by “participating in protected union activity” like petitioning.” Read more

 

Walmart GoLocal Announces Rina Hurst, Former Chief Business Officer at Shipt, as Vice President “Before Shipt, Hurst spent ten years at Target in a variety of roles across merchandising and business partnerships and began her career in management consulting.” Press release

 

HOME DEPOT ASSIST – 77-year-old veteran facing fines from city; instead, gets house remodeled for free at WLNS 6. “Rahn said DeWitt Township has been great to work with, giving the VFW post as much time as necessary to help Smith. Home Depot then reached out to the post, giving them a grant that would pay for the remodeling of Smith’s home.” Read more

 

Why Costco is so popular among the Amish at Business Insider. “One reason the couple says Amish people love Costco is because the stores where a large Amish community resides, like the one in Lancaster, Pennsylvania, cater to their preferred mode of transport: horse and buggy. “There is a shed in the parking lot for them to park their horses and buggies, and it’s just fantastic,” David said.” Read more

 

Home Depot Tracked a Crime Ring and Found an Unusual Suspect at Wall Street Journal. “For years, Robert Dell ran a drug recovery program at what was known as The Rock Community Church and Transformation Center in St. Petersburg, Fla. On the side, prosecutors say, Dell also ran an organized retail-crime ring. The pastor had been working as a fence, the middleman buying stolen goods from thieves and reselling them for a profit, according to prosecutors.” WSJ subs. 

 

Walmart’s Mexico unit to face anti-trust panel after three-year investigation at Reuters. “Specifics of the allegations were not immediately clear. In 2020, Cofece flagged concern about large retail chains imposing terms on their suppliers, saying such practices created risk for the smaller companies and could hit their finances.” Read more