PURCHASE, N.Y. — U.S. retail sales (excluding automotive) increased 7.6% year over year this holiday season, according to Mastercard SpendingPulse, which defines the season as the period running from November 1 through December 24. Mastercard SpendingPulse measures in-store and online retail sales across all forms of payment and is not adjusted for inflation. “This holiday
SEATTLE — Amazon is cutting more than 18,000 jobs, the company announced this month. The e-commerce behemoth said it had hired too many warehouse workers in response to shoppers’ growing preference for online ordering. The company had 1.54 million workers at the end of the third quarter, making it one of the country’s largest employers.
JACKSONVILLE, Fla. — Southeastern Grocers Inc. (SEG), parent company and home of Fresco y Más, Harveys Supermarket and Winn-Dixie grocery stores, has announced plans to open three new Winn-Dixie stores to support economic growth in its communities. The first Winn-Dixie store was opened shortly before Christmas in the rapidly growing Grand Cypress neighborhood in a
WEST DES MOINES, Iowa — Hy-Vee Inc. chief executive officer Jeremy Gosch was named vice chairman of Hy-Vee’s board of directors, in one of five leadership changes announced by Hy-Vee executive chairman of the board and executive director Randy Edeker at the company’s annual stockholder’s meeting. Other leadership changes announced at the meeting: Longtime Hy-Vee
PHILADELPHIA — Rite Aid Corp. reported a narrower-than-projected loss and topped Wall Street’s revenue forecast for its third quarter. The company reported an adjusted loss of $7.9 million, or 14 cents a share. Analysts had estimated it would be 15 cents a share. Revenue of $6.08 billion bettered Wall Street’s expectation of $5.94 billion. For
ARLINGTON, Va. — The FMI Foundation has announced the recipients of its 2022 Gold Plate Awards. The winners were named last month during a livestreamed Gold Plate Awards Celebration, cohosted by FMI Foundation executive director David Fikes and FMI – The Food Industry Association president and chief executive officer Leslie Sarasin. The Gold Plate Awards
WASHINGTON — The National Retail Federation (NRF) has applauded the inclusion of the “Integrity, Notification, and Fairness in Online Retail Marketplaces (INFORM) for Consumers Act” in year-end congressional omnibus legislation. “On behalf of the retail industry, we are extremely pleased negotiators included the INFORM Consumers Act in the omnibus package,” NRF senior vice president of
GRAND RAPIDS, Mich. — Meijer, a retailer that operates one of the largest fleets in Michigan with 250 semitrucks and the first in North America to implement the Environmental Protection Agency’s 2010 near-zero emissions standards in 2009, is once again leading the retail industry by deploying two of the first all-electric semitrucks outside of California.
NUNEATON, England — Holland & Barrett International Ltd. this month appointed former Walgreens Boots Alliance co-chief operating officer Alex Gourlay as its new executive chairman. Gourlay replaces Michael Casey, who will remain as a non-executive member of the board at one of Europe’s largest health and wellness retailers. Founded more than 150 years ago, Holland
Mass retailing has embarked on an extended season of unprecedented change, which will inevitably reorder the segment’s long-settled order of things. Where or when this season will end is anyone’s guess. How the ending will impact the community is far from certain. This much, however, is certain: What’s past is prologue — and the future
As the Consumer Price Index was rising at a rate of 7% or more per month over the past year, mass market retailers and their customers learned to cope with market conditions not present in this country for four decades. Despite some recent moderation in the inflation rate — it stood at 7.1% in November,
Shrink is a problem that’s as old as retailing, and it’s actually a number of separate issues — theft by customers (shoplifting), theft by employees, vendor fraud, operational errors and things like damage, waste and spoilage. But, as has been noted previously on this page, the shoplifting problem has increased dramatically in recent years, driven