Happening Tomorrow:  Earnings Releases for Family Dollar, SuperValu and Costco (Dec. Sales Results)…

 

“At Wal-Mart, moving the needle on e-commerce – Neil Ashe talks to Fortune” by Jessi Hempel at Fortune.  “Wal-Mart has largely watched Amazon clean up on web retail over the past decade while it largely ignored the centrality of the Internet to the shopping experience. Ashe believes that shoppers’ shifting expectations will work to the company’s advantage. “This is about how we take the assets we have and make them contemporary,” he says.”  See the video interview / Read more

 

“Customer Satisfaction Report:  Walmart Most Improved in Mobile; Amazon #1 in Satisfaction; Publix Beats Apple in Store Satisfaction”  “Web channel: While Amazon (88) led the pack for Web satisfaction, some retail sites such as vitacost.com (86), keurig.com (84) and llbean.com (84) are creeping closer. Basspro.com (83) and crateandbarrel.com (80) tied for the most improved sites with seven-point gains in customer satisfaction from last year.”  Read more

 

“Costco co-founder Sinegal honored with top retail award” by Angel Gonzalez at Seattle Times.  “Costco Wholesale co-founder Jim Sinegal has been awarded the National Retail Federation’s Gold Medal Award, the organization said Tuesday…The award will be presented Monday in a ceremony at the National Retail Federation’s annual convention in New York City.” Read more

 

“Home Depot Uses Sales Data to Track Top Adopters of Energy Efficient Bulbs” by Mary Mazzoni at Triple Pundit.  “With the last leg of the gradual phase-out already in effect, Home Depot released a data-driven map that uses sales numbers to create a per capita look at U.S. adoption of energy efficient bulbs. By combining the latest 2010 Census data with U.S. sales from 2012 through 2013, the home improvement giant compiled a list of the top 50 cities for efficient bulb adoption”  Read more

 

“Do Online Grocers Beat Supermarkets?  A Six-City Buyer’s Test Involving 14 Basic Items” by Geoffrey Fowler at WSJ.  “The biggest surprise from our experiment is that, in a few cities, online groceries, even with their delivery charges, were actually cheaper than or roughly equivalent to going to the supermarket. For a Walmart delivery in San Francisco, my test basket of groceries cost about 10% less than at the Safeway supermarket where I usually shop.”  Read more

 

“309lb of Cocaine Sent to Aldi Stores in Banana Boxes” at BBC.  “Police in Berlin have found 140kg (309lb) of cocaine hidden in banana boxes which were sent to a supermarket in an apparent mistake by traffickers.  Cocaine valued at 6m euros (£5m; $8.2m) was found in fruit sent to five branches of Aldi-Nord in and around the German capital, police said…Smugglers probably made a “logistical error”, a police spokesman said.”  Read more

 

“If Your Phone Knows Which Aisle You’re In, Will It Have Deals on Groceries?” by Joshua Brustein at Businessweek.  “Todd Dipaola has seen the future of advertising, and it’s a Giant Eagle grocery store in Cleveland.  Dipaola’s company, inMarket, will today begin turning on a network of sensors in dozens of grocery stores in Cleveland, Seattle, and San Francisco that will allow companies to beam advertisements to people’s smartphones at the exact moment they’re standing in aisle six trying to decide which brand of beans to buy.”  Read more

 

“Amazon:  “Bar-Raisers” Must Sign Off on New Hires, “Program Exacting a Toll”  by Gren Bensinger at WSJ.  “There is no company that sticks to its process like Amazon does,” says Valerie Frederickson, whose eponymous Menlo Park, Calif., human-resources consultancy works with Silicon Valley companies…”They don’t just hire the best of what they see; they’re willing to keep looking and looking for the right talent.”  As Amazon’s payroll has swelled to 110,000 employees, however, the program is exacting a toll, current and former employees say.”  Read more

 

“Peapod Opens Digital Innovation Center in Chicago” by Alaric Dearment at Drug Store News.  “Peapod Propulsion Labs is designed to leverage Peapod’s e-commerce expertise across our organization as we continue to take steps to help customers shop where they want, how they want and when they want.”  Read more

 

“Walmart’s Chief Information Officer,  Karenann Terrell to Speak at “Future of Jobs” Summit”  “On January 14, 2014, the Diplomatic Courier, in collaboration with the STEMconnector and the CumberlandCenter’s Global Action Platform, will convene “The World In 2050: Talent Mobility and the Future of Jobs,” a global forum on January 14, 2014 from 8:30 a.m. until 3:30 p.m. at the National Press Club.”  Read more

 

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