Finance & Capital Management

Target Corp.’s ongoing recovery stalled a bit in the first quarter as the chain joined the list of retailers posting disappointing Q1 sales amid cool, unspring like weather and sluggish retail spending. But it was not all gloom and doom for the discounter, whose online sales continued their upward course and whose profit topped estimates.

Target on Tuesday announced the hire of Mark Tritton as EVP and chief merchandising officer. In this role, Tritton will oversee enterprise buying, product design and development, sourcing, visual merchandising strategy and merchandising transformation and operations for the retailer.

The long-awaited changes to federal overtime rule will be unveiled later today at an event in Columbus, Ohio, headlined by Vice President Joe Biden, Labor Secretary Thomas Perez and Ohio Senator Sherrod Brown (D). The most notable change is a nearly doubling of the current salary threshold from its current $23,360 to $47,476 under which virtually all workers will be eligible for time and a half pay. The dramatic change would make nearly five million currently exempt employees nationwide eligible and will go into effect Dec. 1.

In a quarter of strong home improvement demand, Mooresville, North Carolina-based Lowe’s reported net earnings of $884 million for the quarter ended April 29, a 31.4% increase over the same quarter lat year. Sales for the quarter increased 7.8% to $15.2 billion. Comp-store sales increased 7.3% overall, and increased 7.5% for the U.S. business.

The nation’s two leading retail associations issued critical statements in response the release of the overtime rule by the U.S. Department of Labor. Under the new regulation, issued by the Labor Department on Wednesday, most salaried workers earning up to $47,476 a year must receive time-and-a-half overtime pay when they work more than 40 hours during a week. The previous cutoff for overtime pay, set back in 2004, was $23,660.

Comp-store sales for the quarter were up 6.5% - with comps for the U.S. stores up 7.4%.   Net earnings for the three months ended May 1 were $1.8 billion, up 14.2% compared with net earnings of $1.6 billion in the same quarter last year.  

While other retailers make news by posting grim first quarter results and closing stores., the nation’s leading off-price retailer is making headlines by doing just the opposite. Amid strong first quarter results that included a 7% rise in same-store sales, TJX Cos. said it plans to open about 150 more stores during the rest of this year, on top of the 47 stores it opened in its first quarter.

Shoppers love a deal – the perception of one anyway – which explains how TJX Companies continues to defy gravity by posting another quarter of strong same store sales growth and improved profitability.