In this year’s holiday twist, Best Buy is selling Barbies and J.C. Penney has TVs by Kavita Kumar at Star Tribune. “It’s still a small category for us, but it’s a fast-growing category,” said CEO Hubert Joly. “We are clearly known as a destination for entertainment, including gaming and movies — and toys are a natural extension of that.” Read more (tiered subs.)

 

This Amazon seller lost $400,000 in sales after being attacked by self-proclaimed ‘virus of Amazon’ at CNBC. “In one text message to Damavandi, a person purporting to represent Krasr called himself the “virus of Amazon” and threatened to put him out of business. “Cash flow is dead,” said Damavandi, who’s already let go of half of his 12 employees. “These guys are putting people out of business overnight.” Read more

 

Why This Christmas Is Make-or-Break for Macy’s by Phil Wahba at Fortune. “Gennette tells Fortune Macy’s is now at “about the right number of doors.”…Closing stores can create a vicious cycle in which reduced brand visibility hurts sales in nearby stores, and vendors stop giving that retailer priority…The company says that in areas where it has closed a physical store, it holds on to an average of only 12% of its sales, either online or at another store.” Read more

 

FCC to Outline Plan to Roll Back Net-Neutrality Rules by John D. McKinnon at Wall Street Journal. “If the rollback survives likely legal challenges, it has the potential to reorder the online business environment. It could give internet providers such as AT&T Inc., Comcast Corp., Charter Communications Inc. and Verizon Communications Inc. more flexibility to use bundles of services and creative pricing to make their favored content more attractive to consumers.” Read more (subs.)

 

Deliv to power same-day grocery delivery for Walmart in San Jose by Sarah Perez at TechCrunch. Read more

 

Retailers Try New Pricing Tricks to Battle Amazon on Black Friday by Khadeeja Safdar at Wall Street Journal. “Since Oct. 1. Target has had the lowest prices for a basket of 10 popular holiday toys, including a Barbie doll, Nerf gun and Xbox videogame, on 38 out of the first 47 days, according to information provided by Thinknum, a data analysis firm.” Read more (subs.)

 

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Wal-Mart reserves 15 Tesla electric big rigs, analyst questions battery life, cost at Talk Business. Read more

 

…Loblaw pre-orders 25 at Toronto Star. “Earlier this month, Loblaw committed to have a fully electric fleet as part of the company’s commitment to reduce its carbon footprint by 2030.” Read more

 

Retailer Auchan says it has not been approached by Amazon in Europe Read more

 

Alibaba Bets $2.9 Billion It Can Take on Wal-Mart in China by Daniella Wei & Lulu Yilun Chen at Bloomberg. “(Alibaba) agreed to acquire 36% of Sun Art Retail Group Ltd., which operates about 400 hypermarkets under the Auchan and RT-Mart banners. As part of the deal, France’s Auchan RetailSA will raise its stake in the Hong Kong-listed company to a similar level, and form an alliance with the internet giant to tackle the same Chinese food retail sector Wal-Mart’s targeting.” Read more

 

Apple’s HomePod delayed until next year at The Verge. Read more

 

Retailers Play Loyalty Card This Holiday Season at Bloomberg. “U.S. consumers hold a total of 3.8 billion memberships in customer-loyalty programs, up from 3.3 billion in 2015, according to a report earlier this year from research firm Colloquy.” Read more

 

Wayfair needs a home for the 10,000 people it plans to hire at Boston Globe Read more (tiered subs.)

 

Activate the Crowd-Control Unit! They’re Opening a Wegmans by Sarah E. Needleman & Heather Haddon at Wall Street Journal. “Across the U.S., grand openings of specialty grocery chains such as Whole Foods Market, Stew Leonard’s and Wegmans Food Markets Inc. are attracting customer hordes. Credit television shows such as “MasterChef” and the spread of so-called food porn on social media, industry observers say, for popularizing party-atmosphere store openings.” Read more (subs.)

 

Tipsheet Extra Stories

Families must make reservations to see Santa Claus at Macy’s flagship

Horrible little kid blamed for destroying $1,300 of makeup at Sephora

Retailers that close on Thanksgiving lose out, says location data

Fake Fingerlings: WowWee granted temporary restraining order against 165 counterfeiters

Goldman Sachs says if you thought 2017 was surprisingly good, just wait for 2018

Read Tipsheet Extra Stories

 

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