Earlier this month retailers had a chance to vent their frustration about the high fees they incur when their customers pay for their purchases with a credit or debit card. The occasion was a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing called “Excessive Swipe Fees and Barriers to Competition in the Credit and Debit Card Systems.” Judiciary Committee
April 22 is Earth Day, an annual occasion first observed in 1970 and meant to raise awareness and inspire action. This year the theme is “Invest in the Planet,” and some retailers are doing just that. Walmart, the planet’s largest retailer, recently announced that its Project Gigaton initiative is now more than halfway to its
The Bureau of Labor Statistics reported earlier this month that the Consumer Price Index, which measures a basket of goods and services, indicated an inflation rate of 7.9% for the 12-month period that ended in February. That’s a number not seen since January 1982, indicating that inflation is higher than it’s been in 40 years.
Shopping in physical stores may be coming back in style. NPD Group reported at the end of November that in-store retail sales had risen to pre-pandemic levels, while the growth of online sales was slowing. “Physical stores are more relevant today than they were before the pandemic,” said Marshal Cohen, chief retail industry advisor for
Consumers care more about sustainability than retailers think they do, a new report suggests. But that doesn’t mean that retailers are ignoring the issue. First Insight conducted a study, in partnership with the Baker Retailing Center at the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania, that polled both consumers and retail executives. It found that
ISSAQUAH, Wash. — Costco Wholesale Corp., even more than most retailers, has a business model built around efficiency. The company offers a limited selection of products, most of them available in only the most popular flavor, color or size, which results in high sales volumes and rapid inventory turns. Combined with the operating efficiencies achieved
The Consumer Technology Association’s (CTA’s) big event, CES, returned to Las Vegas this month after COVID-19 forced an all-digital show last year. The embrace of the in-person event — CES 2022 drew about 2,300 exhibiting companies — in the face of a lingering pandemic may suggest that there are limits to the kinds of human
One challenge big companies face is the constant need to find ways to get even bigger. Scott Galloway, professor of marketing at the Stern School of Business at New York University, led off this year’s Emerson Group Industry Day event with a presentation that touched on how disruptive it can be when big companies make
Last month Walgreens said it was closing five stores in San Francisco, not because they were unpopular with consumers, but because they were too popular with thieves. The stealing was brazen — one man repeatedly raided a store astride a bicycle, exiting toting a garbage bag full of stolen goods. Walgreens said the losses made
Will supply chain constraints be the Grinch that steals Christmas this year, and maybe Thanksgiving too? A recent survey from the NPD Group found that more than 40% of U.S. consumers said they had already purchased their holiday gifts by October. Among those early holiday shoppers, 42% said they started shopping early because they feared
It’s been more than nine months since the arrival of vaccines that were supposed to put a stop to the pandemic, allow frustrated consumers to start traveling and eating in restaurants again, and spark an economic boom. But not everyone is getting vaccinated, the virus is mutating and sticking around, the economic picture is mixed,
COVID-19 convinced a lot of consumers to try online grocery shopping for the first time, and many plan to keep buying food that way long after the viral threat has receded and they’ve put their face masks and hand sanitizer away. Already more consumers say they are shopping online because it is easy and convenient