Consumer Affairs & Relations

Los Angeles - The Court of Paris has rejected every claim asserted by Gucci in a six-year trademark suit filed against Guess Inc., finding no trademark infringement, no counterfeiting, and no unfair competition. The court also completely denied Gucci’s request for $62.4 million in damages and, instead, Gucci was ordered by the court to pay Guess $34,000.

The court also invalidated three of Gucci’s “G” community and international trademarks, meaning Gucci cannot claim exclusive use to those marks any longer.

Issaquah, Wash. -- Costco Wholesale Corp. has declared a special one-time dividend of $5 per share that will result in approximately $2.2 billion being returned to shareholders.  

In its mostly recently reported quarter, Costco posted a 17% increase in profits, driven by lower gasoline prices and strong growth in store sales and membership fees.

Boise, Idaho - Albertsons LLC and Safeway Inc. have completed their proposed merger, ending a nearly year-long process that began in March 2014. AB Acquisition LLC, the owner of Albertson's and New Albertson's, Inc., will acquire all outstanding shares of Safeway.

The merger will create a diversified network that includes 2,230 stores, 27 distribution facilities and 19 manufacturing plants with more than 250,000 employees across 34 states and the District of Columbia.

Many U.S. retailers have difficulty being successful in the Great White North of Canada. Now that Target is exiting, can Walmart fill the gap? A new article suggests that it can, if Walmart works at it hard enough.

Financial blog The Motley Fool reports that Walmart can succeed where Target failed. 

San Francisco – Sabrina Simmons has been elected to the board of directors of Williams-Sonoma Inc. Simmons has served as executive VP, CFO of Gap Inc. since January 2008.

Gap Inc. has implemented yet another management shake-up, this time eliminating its creative director.

Rebecca Bay, whom the apparel retailer brought in from Hennes & Mauritz in September 2012 to help revive its namesake brand, has left the company.

The retailer also said that it has named Gap Inc. veteran Scott Key as general manager of customer experience, overseeing a newly created e-commerce and marketing organization, as the company aims to sharpen its focus on customers.

Matthews, N.C. – Howard Levine, CEO of Family Dollar Stores Inc., reportedly plans to sell between one and two million shares of company stock in the next 10 days. According to the Charlotte Business Journal, Levine filed his intention to make the sale with SEC.

Hangzhou, China – The Chinese regulatory agency State Administration for Industry and Commerce (SAIC) has reportedly criticized Alibaba Group Holding Ltd. for not making enough effort to prevent the sale of counterfeit items on its e-commerce platform. According to the Wall Street Journal, the SAIC issued a report starting Alibaba offers insufficient product information and does not use an effective system to rank sellers.