Retail Industry Archive

Costco (Cost) is no longer restocking Coca-Cola (KO) products in a shot across the beverage maker’s bow on pricing, one that could have some significant ramifications As Bruce Watson of Daily Finance pointed out in a blog post last week, Walmart pressure on Coke for better pricing is the root of the dispute. Walmart has hammered away at soft drink makers for decades. Even 20 years ago, before...

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Walmart really didn’t need a study coming out that says it hurts local businesses when it enters a market but what the retailer might not have needed is something it might be able to use. Walmart (WMT) scrutiny has been raised a notch because of last year’s Black Friday incident when one of its stores on New York’s Long Island suffered a death among its staff when customers anxious to...

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Yesterday, in a post in this blog, Teri Llach, of the Blackhawk Network discussed gift cards and how that business is evolving in this holiday season. And it isn’t just growing in its conventional role. Blackhawk Network, a division of Safeway (SWY), operates Gift Card Malls, kiosks that appear in supermarkets and some other retail environments that provide gift cards for restaurants,...

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Discounter Target Corp. might soon open more stores in urban locales. In an interview with Bloomberg published Nov. 18., Chairman and CEO Gregg Steinhafel said: “We know that consumers in dense urban areas love Target. We have to work harder at trying to get a smaller Target in those areas.” So the question is: What’s taking the retailer so long to capitalize on the plan? As...

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As the holidays approach, gift cards become a critical part of the retail equation both for shoppers trying to figure out what to give and retailers who have seen them become a force that has changed the shape of the season, shifting activity into January and providing them with additional options for approaching consumers. When The Nielsen Co., as part of its annual holiday forecast, asked...

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The normal is upon us, but will the new normal be a Walmart world? A whole series of posts in this blog have discussed the recent Walmart (WMT) analyst meeting, and only covered the first 90 minutes of a two-day event and just detailed what the company planned for the United States. Yet, that’s still a lot of important detail for those who want to weigh what Walmart’s impact on retail...

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Betting on sporting events is a common pastime, whether it’s odds on a Super Bowl win or the Kentucky Derby. One betting Web site, though, is hoping that people will want to wager on Black Friday, one of the biggest shopping days of the year for retailers. Bookmaker.com offers potential betters the ability to wager on how much the average consumer will spend on Black Friday and how many...

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So, will Macy’s stumble in the holiday season or is it just playing possum? Although the company reported a third-quarter loss that was less than expected, the department store’s guidance for the holidays didn’t live up to analysts’ expectations, which hurt its stock and renewed speculation that the frugal consumer might snub it this holiday season. Macy’s (M) inventory,...

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Supermarket really want to take back customers who became more partial to taking their refreshment outside the home over the past couple of decades, and, if that means serving up drinks, that’s fine. Recently, some major supermarket operators have announced they are launching foodservice initiatives that include alcohol service. The recession has encouraged supermarkets to take on more...

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People are getting older, they’re getting the flu, they’re worried about money, and that all spelled better results for CVS in the third quarter. One of the ironies of being in the drug store business is that providing the kind of services shoppers require means making money from their problems. Sometimes it’s just a matter of not having time to get to the supermarket, but, often, the...

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