Eye-on-Retail Tipsheet 3/12/13: Costco comps +5%; Walmart doubles-up in Sioux Falls
“NASCAR Sees Growth In Fan Involvement From Partnership With Walmart” by Alicia Jessop at Forbes. “The birth of the Walmart partnership was predicated upon an internal business decision made by NASCAR. ”Before forming NASCAR Team Properties to consolidate a lot of the merchandising rights in the business, all of our rights from a retail standpoint for our teams were handled individually. If a company wanted to come in and make products with NASCAR and a driver, they would have to do individual deals with the teams and NASCAR. NASCAR Team Properties has allowed us to go to the retailers directly as one entity and deliver the sport to them,” Davidson explained.” Read more: https://www.forbes.com/sites/aliciajessop/2013/03/11/nascar-sees-growth-in-fan-involvement-from-partnership-with-walmart/
“Costco’s Net Soars as Sales Keep Growing” by Saabira Chaudhuri at Wall Street Journal. “Ahead of the company’s earnings release, analysts at William Blair pointed to the company’s same-store sales gain for February, saying same-store traffic growth continues to be driven by growth in food and consumables. The firm said that unlike large-cap discount peers such as Target Corp. and Wal-Mart Stores Inc., who recently logged weaker sales in February, Costco continues to generate consistent, strong growth across all general merchandise categories, which William Blair said is a reflection of its low e-commerce risk profile. Tuesday, Costco reported that total same-store sales were up 5% for the period, excluding currency fluctuations and inflation in gasoline price.” Read more: https://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424127887324735304578355833310183530.html?mod=pls_whats_news_us_business_f
“Retailer Costco’s Profit Tops Expectations” at Reuters via CNBC. “Retailer Costco Wholesale posted a 39 percent increase in quarterly profit, beating expectations, on increasing sales, membership fees and a tax benefit related to a special cash dividend.” Read more: https://www.cnbc.com/id/100538980
“Amazon Preparing Bid For Barnes And Noble?” by Steven Rosenbaum at Forbes. “There’s been a lot of buzz about who will make a bid for Barnes and Noble – with the current rumors including Walmart and Microsoft. Both companies had kicked the tires in the past, and so it seems reasonable to expect they’d look again. But the real player in the space – and in some ways the most strategic buyer – would be Amazon.” Read more: https://www.forbes.com/sites/stevenrosenbaum/2013/03/11/amazon-preparing-bid-for-barnes-and-noble/
“Target closes its ‘Shops at Target’ boutique-in-a-big-box concept” by Ed Stych at Minneapolis St. Paul Business Journal. “Target says it is done experimenting for now with its “Shops at Target” concept that featured a handful of select independent boutique retailers selling their wares in the big-box stores. Target may bring the concept back at a later date, but it currently wants to focus on partnerships with designers such as Missoni and Prabal Gurung on at a time, the Star Tribune reports.” Read more: https://www.bizjournals.com/twincities/news/2013/03/09/shops-at-target-terminated.html
“Walmart to open two Supercenters at same time in Sioux Falls — first town in America to get two at once according to official” by Angela Kennecke at Kelo Television (Video and Text). “Monday’s announcement of two more Walmart stores for the city follows a number of big and small retail additions coming to Sioux Falls. There’s a reason why retailers are eyeing the city and the prediction for future growth in the coming year.” Read more: https://www.keloland.com/newsdetail.cfm/retail-roundup/?id=145057
“Publix Names New Executives in Purchasing and Manufacturing” by Kyle Kennedy at The Ledger. “In corporate purchasing, Dave Bornmann will be promoted to senior vice president…With Bornmann’s promotion to senior vice president, Pete Mowitt will be promoted to vice president – grocery/non-foods.” Read more: https://www.theledger.com/article/20130311/NEWS/130319858/1178?Title=Publix-Names-New-Executives-in-Purchasing-and-Manufacturing
“Maker of 3-D Printed Guns Speaks Out at SXSW: They’re Real, and They’re Not Going Away” by Lauren Goode at All Things D. “If you’ve been listening to all the press, you would think 3-D printing is just about making cupcakes, or lawn gnomes,” he said. “But if 3-D printing is going to be a meaningful technology, printing guns is going to be a part of that.” Wilson went on to say that 3-D gun printing isn’t just about making hardware, but also the software. Defense Distributed has an online repository of around 100 3-D design files, he said, which have been downloaded more than 400,000 times since the end of December.” Read more: https://allthingsd.com/20130311/3-d-printed-gun-maker-speaks-out-at-sxsw-theyre-real-and-theyre-not-going-anywhere/
“U.S. Expansion Remains a Top Growth Strategy for Retailers” “Despite recent headlines trumpeting retailers’ entry into Canadian and overseas markets, U.S. expansion remains a key growth strategy. According to a new survey of 100 retail chief financial officers by BDO USA, LLP, 30 percent of CFOs say U.S. expansion will be their priority growth tactic in 2013. Expanding retailers like Apple and H&M will continue to look for Class-A store locations in high-traffic spots to afford better access and convenience for customers. In addition to store expansion, CFOs also say improving merchandise assortment (24 percent) and e-commerce and mobile commerce (22 percent) will be top growth tactics this year.” Read more: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20130312005502/en/U.S.-Expansion-Remains-Top-Growth-Strategy-Retailers?utm_source=dlvr.it&utm_medium=twitter
“Target and FEED Partner on Exclusive Collection to Fight Hunger in the U.S.” “Target today announced a partnership with FEED Projects, a social business founded by Lauren Bush Lauren, to create the FEED USA + Target collection. The limited-time-only collection will include more than 50 stylish products and benefit Feeding America, the nation’s leading domestic hunger-relief charity. The products will be available beginning June 30 at Target stores and on Target.com.” Read more: https://www.businesswire.com/portal/site/home/permalink/?ndmViewId=news_view&newsLang=en&newsId=20130311005680&div=-1245645151
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