“Dept. of Homeland Security Asks Retailers to Watch Customers Behavior” by Stephen Dinan at Washington Times. “Homeland Security Secretary Jeh Johnson said his department will be issuing new guidance to retailers this week giving them pointers on how to spot potential terrorists among their customers by looking at what they’re buying. While saying the government cannot prohibit sales of some everyday materials, Mr. Johnson said retailers should be trained to look for anyone who buys a lot from what he described as a “long list of materials that could be used as explosive precursors.” Read more

 

Target’s Annual Meeting Highlights:

“Target revs up managers for holidays” by Kavita Kumar at Star-Tribune. “After Jamie Foxx and before Taylor Swift, the new leader of Target Corp. took the stage before thousands of his top managers and employees and laid out the company’s challenge in six words. “We need to be cool again,” Brian Cornell said Wednesday afternoon in the climactic event of Target’s annual two-day gathering…Target also announced it was teaming up with comedian and talk show host Ellen DeGeneres.” Read more

 

“With new CEO, Target ready to move forward” by Hadley Malcolm at USA Today. “(Brian Cornell) says changing the way Target is talked about by media is the biggest challenge the company still faces. Target’s internal data show customers have moved on from the data breach, he says, “yet every article that gets written about Target has a paragraph about the data breach. We have work to do, but we are in a much butter place than the media broadly gives us credit for.” Read more

 

“Wal-Mart rebrands Express formats to Neighborhood Markets” at The City Wire. “All 21 of the Express formats and all future small formats will bear the name Neighborhood Market. It’s a widely known and accepted brand that consumers can easily identify with,” said Wal-Mart corporate spokesman John Forrest Ales.” Read more

 

“Family Dollar Fate May Hinge on Decision by Billionaire Paulson” at Bloomberg. “If you get 22 percent on one side of the fence, it’s a pretty high hurdle for Dollar General to cross to win enough shareholders over,” Hebert said. “Winning over a majority of shareholders becomes substantially more difficult.” Read more

 

Former Home Depot CEO Bob Nardelli Appears on Fox Business to Discuss Breach: “Home Depot will do all the right things”  See the video

 

“Wal-Mart’s School Supplies Are a Little More Expensive Online” by Vanessa Wong at Bloomberg. “Analysts at Bloomberg Intelligence, compared 31 identical school supplies at Walmart stores and on Walmart.com—crayons, markers, pens, etc.—and found cheaper prices in the stores in three of four surveys. Wal-Mart’s official policy is to have the same prices online as in stores, spokewoman Jaeme Laczkowski says. The difference wasn’t great: at most, a 1.8 percent premium on a $118 checkout.” Read more

 

Forbes: “The 25 Companies Investing The Most In America’s Future (Walmart #5, Amazon #25)” by Christopher Helman. “A new report out today from Diana Carew and Michael Mandel at the Progressive Policy Institute details the 25 big businesses — dubbed “investment heroes” — that are placing the biggest bets on America.” See the list

 

“Wal-Mart joins U.S. crop-tour fever seeking food chain edge” by Karl Plume at Reuters. “The Pro Farmer crop tour last month involved 120 people, double the number a decade ago, from countries spanning Switzerland to Argentina…Wal-Mart sent representatives for the first time on this tour…”We are always looking for ways to better understand our business. We attend farm tours to learn about crops so we can make smart buying decisions in our efforts to pass on savings to our customers,” said Tim Robinson, Wal-Mart’s director of dry grocery, who traveled from Ohio to Minnesota with the tour.” Read more

 

“Restoration Hardware Comp Revenue Up 14% in Q2” “We did experience a sales shortfall during our Fourth of July Promotional Event as we underestimated the negative effect of the later Source Book mailing which led to lower than expected revenues in the second quarter.” Read the release

 

Study: Buy Online, Pickup In Store Will Boost Holiday Retail: “82% percent would consider doing so to receive a $10 rebate on a $50 item.” Read the release

 

Report: Sears may not have enough cash beyond 2016 by Alexia Elejalde-Ruiz at Chicago Tribune. “Sears took issue with the report, saying: “We don’t agree with their action given our demonstrated history of honoring our financial commitments while continuing to invest in our transformation. We have proven that we have an asset rich portfolio that provides us with what we believe to be substantial financial flexibility.” Read more

 

“RadioShack posts tenth straight quarterly loss” at CNBC. “RadioShack’s same-store sales declined 20 percent.” Read obituary

 

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