“Does Wal-Mart’s New ‘Empowering Women’ Program Signal a Turning Point in Socially Conscious Retailing?” by Barbara Thau at Forbes.“Wal-Mart has launched a shop on Walmart.com that will offer more than 20 items from 19 small, women-owned businesses – including nine in the U.S. — from nine countries.  It’s all for sale on Wal-Mart’s “Store For Good.” These include apparel and accessories such as a $20 woven dress from Gahaya Links, a Rwandan company that helps economically-challenged women who are still rebounding from that country’s1994 genocide; jewelry like an $18 sliver necklace from Colorado-based Women’s Bean Project, an organization devoted to creating a safe work environment for unemployed and impoverished women; and home goods that include a $12 paper mache vase from Full Circle Exchange, another company designed to help poor women attain economic security.”  Read more:  https://www.forbes.com/sites/barbarathau/2013/03/14/does-wal-marts-new-empowering-women-program-signal-a-turning-point-in-socially-conscious-retailing/

 

“Home Depot’s CEO Frank Blake talks GDP & the Housing Recovery” at CNBC (Video interview and Text).  “Housing is getting better,” Blake said. “You can see it in terms of household formation, housing turnover, new home starts. There are a lot of data saying housing is actually improving.” But he said it will still be a slow process…Tim Wadhams, CEO of home improvement and building materials company Masco, meanwhile, predicted that the housing recovery will go on for four or five years.  See and read more:  https://www.cnbc.com/id/100550492

 

“Target to Expand Cooking and Kitchenware Business With Two E-Commerce Acquisitions”  “Target Corp. today announced agreements to acquire CHEFS Catalog and assets of Cooking.com in two separate transactions. The e-commerce acquisitions are aimed at expanding Target’s presence in the growing cooking and kitchenware market.  “We know consumers are increasingly looking online for cooking solutions to make their lives easier – from utensils and cookware, to recipes. These strategic transactions provide us a great way to address this growing opportunity and will offer expanded online options for our guests.”  Read more:  https://www.businesswire.com/portal/site/home/permalink/?ndmViewId=news_view&newsLang=en&newsId=20130314005848&div=-1245645151

 

“Apple Stores in France banned from forcing employees to work late” by Amar Toor at The Verge.  “According to French labor laws, companies can only require employees to work between the hours of 9PM and 6AM if they prove that doing so is necessary to maintain economic activity or to provide social services. The Apple Stores in question — including the outlet at l’Opéra in Paris — all officially close their doors at 9PM, but employees are often required to stay as late as 11PM in order to shut down and clean the facilities.”  Read more:  https://www.theverge.com/2013/3/13/4098052/french-judge-bans-apple-store-employees-from-working-nights

 

“A look inside Kroger’s new Poplar Plaza store (Memphis)” by Andy Ashby at Memphis Business Journal (Text and Pictures).  “When Kroger Co. opens its new Poplar Plaza location, shoppers will see the accumulated knowledge of their own shopping habits.  The grocery chain is opening its 90,000-square-foot store at 6 a.m. March 20 after expanding the 55,000-square-foot location in the same parking lot.”  Read and see more:  https://www.bizjournals.com/memphis/blog/2013/03/a-look-inside-krogers-new-poplar.html

 

“What Do You Do With the World’s Fastest Internet Service?” by Farhad Manjoo in Slate.  “Gigabit broadband is like that. For it to become truly useful and necessary, we’ll need to see a long-term feedback loop of utility and acceptance. First, super-fast lines must allow us to do things that we can’t do with the pedestrian Internet. This will prompt more people to demand gigabit lines, which will in turn invite developers to create more apps that require high speed, and so on. What I discovered in Kansas City is that this cycle has not yet begun. Or, as Ars Technica put it recently, “The rest of the Internet is too slow for Google Fiber.”  Read more:  https://www.slate.com/articles/technology/technology/2013/03/google_fiber_review_nobody_knows_what_to_do_with_the_world_s_fastest_internet.2.html

 

“Google Shopping Bests Amazon at its Own Game” by Federico Einhorn at Search Engine Journal.  “The data from the second half of 2012 (Q3 and Q4) showed that Google not only improved upon its own performance, but bested Amazon Product Ads in the process. Google Shopping sent more traffic to advertisers’ sites in the second half of 2012 and saw lower CPC rates compared to Amazon as well.  Google Shopping traffic in 2012 was nearly double that of its 2011 performance, but the more impressive numbers came in the almost immediate reversal in traffic in favor of Google Shopping over Amazon Product Ads.”  https://www.searchenginejournal.com/google-shopping-bests-amazon-at-its-own-game/60100/

 

“Safeway Leans In Sandberg’s Direction” by Carol Agrisani at Supermarket News.  “Safeway has partnered with Facebook COO Sheryl Sandberg’s “Lean In” initiative.  “Safeway is ‘leaning in’ because we believe in empowering employees and advancing their leadership growth and capabilities,” Russ Jackson, Safeway’s senior vice president, human resources, said in a statement on the leanin.org website. “We are continuously exploring innovative resources and development tools to help grow future women leaders in an increasingly competitive environment.”  Read More:  https://supermarketnews.com/safeway/safeway-leans-sandberg-s-direction#ixzz2Nbl4RWVo

 

“Google And Target Are Top Brands For Social Currency” by Kurt Badenhausen in Forbes.  “Target is the top retailer and ranks No. 3 overall. The brand has a well-organized social strategy across networks, including Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, YouTube, Instagram, Tumblr and LinkedIn. There is something for everyone on Facebook, including applications designed for newlyweds, bargain hunters, the tech savvy and everything in between. Target realizes a higher repurchase or loyalty rate than Wal-Mart (ranks No. 10 overall), according to Vivaldi.”  Read more:  https://www.forbes.com/sites/kurtbadenhausen/2013/03/12/subway-google-and-target-are-top-brands-for-social-currency/

 

“Yahoo COO Henrique De Castro joins Target board” by Shana Lynch at Silicon Valley Business Journal.  “Castro was one of the early additions to Yahoo CEO Marissa Mayer’s management team. She hired him in October 2012 from Google, where he was a top advertising executive.  At Yahoo, he oversees sales, media, business development and worldwide operations. In January, he reorganized the company’s ad sales unit, focusing on a model similar to Google’s.”  Read more:  https://www.bizjournals.com/sanjose/news/2013/03/13/yahoo-coo-henrique-de-castro-joins.html

 

Thanks for reading…

 

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