News Briefs

BYLT is broadening its market reach by expanding on two different fronts.

The apparel brand, which launched online in 2016 and currently has 15 stores, primarily in malls, plans to open seven locations in 2026, including a second store in Chicago, in the Gold Coast area. It will open its first New York City location, in Brooklyn, in the first quarter 2027. 

Based in Irvine, Calif., BYLT launched online in 2016 offering men’s casual essentials. It expanded into womenswear about two years ago. The company also has a kidswear collection.

In other moves, BYLT will introduce wholesale as a new distribution channel this year. The initiative will start with targeted partnerships, including select Bloomingdale's doors.  

Leadership

As BYLT expands, it has bolstered its leadership team with seasoned executives from global athletic and lifestyle brands. The new appointments include Jared Koenig, formerly with eyewear brand Oakley, as COO and president, and  Davide Mattucci, who previously held roles at Adidas, Under Armour and Columbia Sportswear, as chief marketing officer.

In addition, Chris Taylor has been named CFO. He previously served as VP of global financial planning and analysis at Boardriders. Joe Trachta, formerly with Oakley, has been named senior VP of product.

“By making these strategic moves, BYLT is positioned for growth beyond its D2C roots into a major omni-channel brand," Mattucci said. “We're looking to optimize the efficiency of D2C with the in-person shopping experiences at owned retail and select wholesale to build an enduring brand that resonates emotionally with consumers."

Walmart Inc. has released its first annual report under the leadership of John Furner, who took the reins as president and CEO in February.

The 2026 report illustrates the retail giant’s growing momentum in e-commerce. Walmart notched revenue growth of 5.1% in constant currency and profit growth of 5.4% on an adjusted basis for the year ended Jan. 31, 2026 (fiscal year 2026) driven by 24% global growth in e-commerce.

E-commerce sales totaled $150.4 billion and positively contributed 4.3% to the year’s comparable sales. That marks an increase from the 2.9% contribution to comps in fiscal 2025.

Walmart reported that its Walmart U.S., Sam's Club U.S. and Walmart International segments contributed to top-line expansion in FY2026.

“Our business model is getting stronger, our associates continue to come up with great ideas, and we have a strong culture and values,” stated Furner. “The consistency of our results reflects strong execution in our core business, digital innovation, re-imagining how we accelerate delivery speed, and business mix.”

Walmart chairman Greg Penner noted that like any investment — whether in AI, automation or store and club expansion and remodel programs — Walmart views capital deployment through the lens of return on investment, and "I’m pleased with the discipline we have."

"This will ensure that we can scale newer, tech-powered businesses alongside our core retail operations to drive growth at a lower marginal cost,” he stated.

To view, Walmart’s 2026 annual report, click here.

Two leading on-demand delivery services are among the apps that are now directly connected to the Claude AI engine.

Instacart and Uber Eats are among 15 apps spanning verticals including design, finance, productivity and health as well as online delivery that are now integrated with Claude, the generative AI model from Anthropic. Claude will now suggest the right app to match a user’s natural language query, within their conversation. 

When more than one connected app could help answer a question, Claude shows them all and lets the user choose, without paid placements or sponsored answers. 

Claude suggests connectors and makes recommendations, but users stay in control of its actions. Connectors are available on all plans, with mobile in beta. In December 2025, Instacart integrated with the OpenAI generative AI model ChatGPT (a direct competitor of Claude), enabling ChatGPT users to surface the Instacart ChatGPT app by starting a prompt with Instacart, such as "Instacart, can you help me shop for apple pie ingredients?" 

[READ MORE: Instacart launches app, end-to-end shopping in ChatGPT]

Meanwhile, Uber Eats recently integrated with the Amazon Alexa+ AI voice assistant to let users who link their account through the Alexa app see a new conversational window, with their past orders automatically synced so they can search for restaurants by name or cuisine, reorder a previous meal, or start a totally new ordering process.

And rival online delivery app DoorDash is beta testing a direct order feature in the Google Gemini agentic AI app, enables recipe-based grocery shopping in ChatGPT, and is also piloting Zesty, a new food discovery app that lets customers use natural language prompts to search for and receive personalized recommendations of local restaurants to order food from or visit for table service.

See a complete list of apps integrating with Claude here.

Walmart’s retail media network is making it easier for advertising partners to target customers via connected TV.

Walmart is unveiling new offerings for brands participating in its Walmart Connect retail media network (launched in 2021 as a revamped version of the Walmart Media Group) to advertise via connected TV. This follows the recent expanded integration of Walmart Connect with the Vizio connected TV/streaming platform, which the discounter purchased at the end of 2024 and made a wholly-owned subsidiary.

[READ MORE: Walmart completes $2.3 billion Vizio acquisition]

Walmart Connect is now introducing two new ways to simplify and scale connected TV activation: Connect Select, a curated marketplace within the Walmart demand side platform (DSP), and expanded integrations with technology partners. 

Connect Select is designed to streamline access to relevant omnichannel inventory with a focus on connected TV. It surfaces recommended inventory optimized for reach and awareness and aligned to campaign goals. Advertisers can discover and activate deals tailored to objectives like product launches, discovery, and brand building.

Combined with Walmart’s measurement capabilities, Connect Select enables advertisers can see how connected TV influences the full-funnel and optimize toward business outcomes such as reducing wasted ad spend and improving media efficiency.

At launch, Connect Select includes inventory from Vizio; CTV publishers, including Paramount, and Warner Bros. Discovery; and supply-side platforms (SSPs), including FreeWheel, Index Exchange, Magnite, and PubMatic. SSP partnerships enable post-auction optimizations.

Advertisers also have access to omnichannel formats including online video, display, and audio. Deals are available through Inventory Controls and Deal Desk.

Walmart Connect is also expanding integrations with technology partners, including Pacvue and Skai at launch, to help advertisers plan, activate, and optimize full-funnel onsite and offsite campaigns in one environment. Pacvue will support campaign management and reporting, while Skai will provide reporting capabilities at launch.

A Texas-based chicken finger chain is starting off 2026 on a high note.

Layne’s Chicken Fingers added more than 50 new restaurants to its development pipeline in the first quarter of the year. The new franchise partners span Victoria, Texas; Sacramento and Fresno, Calif.; northeastern Pennsylvania; and Charlotte, N.C. (a 27-unit agreement). Layne's also continued expansion with existing owners, including new deals signed for Oklahoma, Arkansas and San Antonio.

The chain added that it opened four new restaurants in Waycross, Ga., and Leander, Rosenberg, and Palestine, Texas, in the first quarter of the year.

"I feel very strongly that the best validation we could ask for is a franchisee making the choice to invest their funds, time and energy in our brand," said Samir Wattar, COO of Layne’s. "Signing agreements with both new owners and current owners who are pleased with how they're doing with Layne's speaks to what we're doing.”

[READ MORE: Huey Magoo's adds 15 new Texas stores to pipeline]

Layne’s says it will continue its franchise growth throughout the year, in addition to launching a new loyalty app for guests. 

"The excitement about Layne's only continues to grow," said CEO Garrett Reed. "The start of this year has been very busy as we've signed agreements with new and existing franchisees, opened new restaurants, and executed 16 leases for future development. Throughout all of this growth, we've maintained our focus on partnering with the right people in the right markets and ensuring the Layne's experience our guests know and love remains intact."

Founded in 1994 in College Station, Texas, Layne’s Chicken Fingers operates more than 40 locations.

A Hispanic-focused California grocer is touting strong results after implementing an AI-powered inventory management system.

Vallarta Supermarkets generated a 1,070% return on investment after implementing Fresh Inventory Management technology from Logile Inc., according to a new ROI Case Study report by Nucleus Research. After the management system helped how it forecasted demand, reduced spoilage, and aligned fresh production with sales, Vallarta recovered its investment in 15 months and generated more than $10 million in attributable profit over three years.

[READ MORE: Vallarta Supermarkets automates detection of soon-to-expire products]

Vallarta rolled out the Fresh Inventory Management system in phases by department, allowing teams to test, refine, and scale new processes while maintaining operations. This allowed store teams to focus production on items with stronger demand, improve consistency in fresh preparation, and reduce overproduction of lower-performing items, according to the report.

In addition to a 15% reduction in software costs through consolidation of legacy systems, Vallarta saw its sales increase across fresh departments, including 1.1% in produce, 1.6% in bakery, 15% in taqueria and 9% in seafood.

“Before Logile, we didn’t have a consistent way to connect demand, production, and execution across fresh,” said Steve Netherton, CIO and VP of continuous improvement at Vallarta Supermarkets. “The platform helped our teams make better daily decisions about what to produce and when, which reduced overproduction and supported stronger sales while maintaining our commitment to fresh, made-from-scratch food.”

Headquartered in Santa Clarita, Calif., Vallarta operates approximately 55 stores throughout California and one store in Arizona.