Amazon Prime Day threatened by strikes at European warehouses over working conditions at CNBC. “A group called Amazon En Lucha organized the walk out at the company’s fulfillment center just outside the Spanish capital of Madrid. The strike will last until July 18 and the employees also called for Amazon workers around Europe to go on strike.” Read more

 

The unintentional winners of Prime Day: Amazon’s competitors at CNBC. “During the week leading up to this year’s event, searches for Amazon were up 544 percent over the previous week…Searches for Best Buy during the same period were up a whipping 712 percent. Walmart during the same time period increased 143 percent.” Read more

 

It will take an immense amount of work to make Amazon’s package delivery business even modestly profitable by Todd Bishop at GeekWire. “Based on Amazon’s projections, “there’s a real possibility that people could find themselves working twice as hard for half the pay vs owning a FedEx route,” said DiNitto, the FedEx delivery business broker.” Read more

 

Gymboree launches its reboot on Amazon Prime Day at CNBC. ““It’s really an all new Gymboree, different in almost every single way,” Gymboree Group Chief Executive Daniel Griesemer told CNBC, speaking of the 32-year-old retailer. “The product is completely re-engineered, redesigned.” Read more

 

Amazon’s Curious Case of the $2,630.52 Used Paperback by David Streitfeld at NY Times. Tiered subs.

 

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The Problem With Innovation: The Biggest Companies Are Hogging All the Gains at The Wall Street Journal. “Scale makes it possible to experiment with advanced technology that is out of reach for many companies. A separate McKinsey Global Institute report, published in April, found early adopters of artificial intelligence may already have gained “an insurmountable advantage” in earnings over competitors who have yet to take the plunge.” Subscription

 

San Antonio Zoo wants to ‘adopt’ Toys R Us mascot by Patrick Danner at Houston Chronicle. “The zoo started a GoFundMe page to raise $100,000 for the Giraffe Conservation Foundation and “to persuade the owners at Toys R Us to join the effort to save giraffes by donating the use of their most recognizable intellectual property.” Read more

 

Kohl’s accused of shorting assistant store managers on pay; company denies allegations by Rick Romell at Milwaukee Journal Sentinel. “Kohl’s Corp. holds down costs by improperly barring assistant store managers from getting overtime pay even though most of their work involves non-supervisory tasks such as unloading freight and stocking shelves, a lawsuit alleges.” Read more

 

Sam’s Club will add the Polish dog to the menu at all locations starting on July 23 by Kate Taylor at Business Insider. “Two petitions to save Costco’s Polish dog, on Change.org and Care2, have earned more than 10,000 signatures in recent days.” Read more

 

These are the retail brands that will be hurt most by Chinese tariffs by Tonya Garcia at MarketWatch. “Raymond James thinks value retailers like Dollar General and Family Dollar are the least exposed since about 80% of their sales are in food, personal care and home cleaning supplies, which are largely sourced domestically.” Read more

 

PayPal is leading a $50 million investment into PPRO, a London-based business that is focused on cross-border payments for merchants at TechCrunch. Read more

 

Swimwear industry ‘on fire’ as Instagram’s year-round summers fill feeds with string bikinis and exotic beach posts at CNBC. “U.S. swimwear sales have been growing at an annualized growth rate of 10 percent in the first few months of this year, up from an average of 3.2 percent from 2010 through 2017.” Read more

 

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