NEW YORK — Helena Foulkes has taken the position of chief executive officer of Hudson’s Bay Co. (HBC), which operates the Lord & Taylor and Saks Fifth Avenue department store chains. She joins HBC from CVS Health, where she worked for 25 years, most recently as corporate executive vice president and president of CVS Pharmacy,
DEERFIELD, Ill. — Walgreens Boots Alliance (WBA) is reportedly seeking to acquire drug distributor AmerisourceBergen Corp. The Wall Street Journal reported on February 13 that representatives of WBA executive vice chairman and chief executive officer Stefano Pessina made “a high-level outreach” to representatives of AmerisourceBergen CEO Steven Collis several weeks before the story came out.
CINCINNATI — Kroger Co. has agreed to sell its convenience store business to EG Group, a privately held c-store retailer based in Blackburn, Lancashire, United Kingdom. The transaction, which is valued at $1.25 billion, is expected to close during the first quarter of Kroger’s financial year, or by May 26. Kroger had announced last October
ARLINGTON, Va. — Two recent studies indicate that household penetration of online grocery shopping is picking up steam. One, a joint project of the Food Marketing Institute (FMI) and Nielsen, projects that in five to seven years 70% of Americans will be grocery shopping online. Last year FMI and Nielsen issued their first-year findings, which
DEERFIELD, Ill. — Rick Gates has been named senior vice president of pharmacy and health care for Walgreens. Prior to his promotion, Gates was serving as group vice president of pharmacy. In his new role, Gates will oversee commercial development and sales, contracting, pharma development, pharmacy supply chain, and clinical programs and alliances. He reports
ARLINGTON, Va. — The Retail Industry Leaders Association (RILA) has elected a new chairman — Brian Cornell, the chairman and chief executive officer of Target Corp. Cornell was elected at RILA’s board of directors’ semiannual meeting in Tucson, Ariz., last month. Serving a two-year term, Cornell takes the chairman’s reins from Bill Rhodes, chairman of
CINCINNATI — Kroger Co. has promoted Steve McKinney, who was previously president of Kroger’s Fry’s Food Stores division, to the post of senior vice president of retail divisions. Monica Garnes, who had been corporate vice president of produce-floral merchandising, will succeed McKinney as Fry’s division president. According to the company, the leadership changes support the
MIAMI — A sense of urgency pervaded the Food Marketing Institute’s (FMI’s) Midwinter Executive Conference here last month. Faced with the tsunami of change sweeping over the industry, retailers and suppliers were eager, in private meetings and public sessions, to hear new ideas and talk about innovative strategies that will enable them to flourish in
Retail pharmacy operators and other health care providers received a jolt last month when Amazon, Berkshire Hathaway and JPMorgan Chase unveiled plans to form a stand-alone company that will address health care for their employees in the U.S., where costs are notoriously high and patient outcomes often vary widely. While details of the venture remain
As recently as last August, online grocery shopping seemed destined to remain a niche pursuit in the United States. A Gallup survey released at the time found that just 4% of Americans said they shop online for groceries on a weekly basis, while only 9% did so at least once a month. That compares to
As the plane descended into New York’s LaGuardia Airport I was thinking about what awaited at the 2018 NRF Big Show. This year I was attending with two very distinct lenses, one seeking to gain greater perspective on the role of digital and innovation and their impact on traditional brick-and-mortar retailers, hearing from amongst the
SEATTLE — Amazon and Whole Foods Market jointly announced the introduction of free, two-hour delivery of natural and organic products from Whole Foods through Prime Now, with plans to expand across the U.S. in 2018. Now, Prime customers in neighborhoods of Austin, Texas; Cincinnati; Dallas; and Virginia Beach, Va., can shop through Prime Now for