Labor & Employment

Walmart is among a group of retailers who further aligned themselves with a key Obama administration initiative this week by committing to open more than 1,500 stores in urban and rural markets defined as food deserts. The initiative is part of the Obama administration’s Let’s Move! campaign designed to address the nation’s weight problem by improving access to fresh foods.

Here are the facts:

• Walmart will open between 275 and 300 stores in food deserts by 2016.

MOORESVILLE, N.C. — Lowe’s has announced the promotion of M. Lee Reeves to SVP, deputy general counsel and assistant secretary. Reeves will continue to report to Gaither Keener, EVP, general counsel, secretary and chief compliance officer.

In his new role, Reeves’ responsibilities include leading the corporate transactions, intellectual property and information technology legal teams.

Reeves joined Lowe’s in 2004 as senior counsel, after serving as a member of a private law firm. 

The ministers of economic development, trade and industry and agriculture, forestry and fisheries in South Africa are protesting the nation’s Competition Tribunal’s approval of a merger agreement between Walmart and Massmart. The three government entities are seeking to set aside a ruling that allowed Walmart to acquire a 51% ownership stake in Massmart last month on the grounds that the tribunal acted irregularly with regard to matters of documents presented during the discovery process and the scheduling of decisions.

MINNEAPOLIS — Supervalu announced that it has named Leon Bergmann as president of its independent business organization, reporting to Craig Herkert, CEO and president. He replaces Mark Anderson, who will be retiring from Supervalu later this summer.

Kudos to Borders for not forgetting its most loyal customers as it begins the slow and painful process of shutting down operations.

NAPERVILLE, Ill. — OfficeMax announced that Steve Parsons has been appointed EVP and chief human resources officer, effective July 25.  In this position, Parsons will report to Ravi Saligram, president and CEO of OfficeMax, and will be responsible for all aspects of global human resources for the company, including talent management, compensation and benefits, training, leadership development, recruitment, diversity, and internal and corporate communications.

Matthews, N.C. -- Family Dollar Stores said Thursday that it has named Christopher Nielsen to the position of VP -- loss prevention.

Nielsen will report to Bryan Venberg, senior VP – human resources.

He began his career at Family Dollar in 1998 as regional loss-prevention director, and was promoted to regional VP in 2001.
 

When the Supreme Court ruled that a sex discrimination case against Walmart wasn’t worth of class action status that was supposed to end things. Wrong.