Finance & Capital Management

Dillard’s Inc. is giving more than $850,000 to local Chapters of Ronald McDonald House Charities after selling its exclusive Southern Living Christmas Cookbook.

For the eighth time, Dillard’s offered a special custom edition of the Southern Living Christmas Cookbook to benefit RMHC. This exclusive, 288-page hardbound cookbook is filled with fabulous holiday recipes, color photos, menus, decorating tips and entertaining ideas.

Aaron's has assembled a new senior leadership team to position the company for growth and success.

The company, led by CEO John W. Robinson, announced the following changes on Tuesday:

• Gilbert L. Danielson will step down as CFO. Until his retirement at the end of 2016, Danielson will remain executive VP, serving as a senior advisor to the leadership team and managing certain strategic projects.

Ascena Retail Group has a new senior VP to lead the company through its next phase of growth.

The company announced that Duane Holloway has been named senior VP and general counsel, effective immediately. Holloway will serve on the company’s leadership team and report to David Jaffe, president and CEO. He will be responsible for overseeing all legal matters for the Company.

Tiffany & Co. says weak tourist spending and a strong dollar hurt its sales results for the two-month holiday period.

The retailer said worldwide net sales declined 3% (due to declines in the Americas and Asia-Pacific offsetting growth in Japan and Europe) and same store sales declined 5%. There were no noteworthy differences in performance among jewelry categories, the company said. Reported in U.S. dollars, worldwide net sales of $961 million were 6% lower than the prior year.

Publix Super Markets continues to make news on the executive front.

National Retail Federation president and CEO Matt Shay shared a message of inspiration and transformation to mark the beginning of the trade group’s annual Big Show, which again drew a record number of attendees to New York.

Joyce Leslie on Monday announced that it filed a motion on January 14th for court approval to set bid procedures and an auction date for a sale of most of its assets.

The young women’s fashion retailer had previously announced that it had filed a voluntary petition under Chapter 11 on Jan. 9.

La-Z-Boy Inc. announced the appointment of James Chickini as VP, real estate, responsible for real estate development initiatives for the La‑Z‑Boy Furniture Galleries store network, including corporate-operated locations, across North America.

When providing the BDO retail IPO outlook for 2015 at the beginning of this year, we asked: Will consumer businesses face a potential Alibaba hangover in 2015?
 

Walmart said it will close 269 stores worldwide this year, including many of its smallest stores, in an unprecedented move CEO Doug McMillon characterized as being more disciplined about growth.