Labor & Employment

New York -- Swedish fast-fashion giant Hennes & Maurtiz AB (H&M) on Wednesday unwrapped its largest store in the world, in New York City’s Herald Square. The 63,000-sq.- store, which is located across from Macy’s, has a custom illuminated store front that wraps around 33rd Street, 34th Street and 6th Avenue. It is the retailer’s 13th store in New York City.

Framingham, Mass. -- Staples Inc. reported a 39% decline in first-quarter profit amid declining sales and store closures. The results came as the chain is waiting for regulatory approval of its proposed takeover of rival Office Depot.

Staples reported a profit of $59 million, down from $96 million a year earlier.

Revenue slid 6.9% to $5.3 billion. Online sales grew 3%.

Same-store fell 5% in the quarter. Store traffic was down 2%, and the average order size fell 3%.

Bentonville, Ark. -- Walmart announced the next step in its Veterans Welcome Home Commitment by guaranteeing a job offer to any eligible U.S. veteran honorably discharged from active duty since the commitment’s original launch on Memorial Day 2013.

The previous commitment was for veterans within 12 months off active duty. In addition to the Veterans Welcome Home Commitment, Walmart is expanding its 2013 projection of hiring 100,000 veterans by 2018, increasing the projection to 250,000 veterans by the end of 2020.

A legal veteran of Abercrombie & Fitch and Harvard Law grad has been named general counsel for Big Lots.

Ronald "Rocky" Robins Jr. becomes SVP general counsel and corporate secretary at Big Lots. Robins will be a member of the executive leadership team of the company and report directly to David Campisi, CEO and president.

Walmart is more than doubling the number of veterans it plans to hire by the year 2020.

Salt Lake City - Phillips Edison & Co. is introducing a new program created to empower and prepare emerging leaders for a successful future. Innovation Labs is a professional development series that places associates from various departments on a team and assigns a real-life challenge facing the company.

Beaverton, Ore. - Richard King, former president and COO of Albertsons Inc., has been elected to the Digimarc board of directors. His 45 years of retail, consumer products and food industry experience will provide advice Digimarc expands its involvement in the retail industry with its barcode technology.

Washington, D.C. - The Obama Administration’s plan to revise federal overtime regulations would likely “hollow out” low- and mid-level management positions in the restaurant and retail industries and result in a shift toward more hourly and part-time workers, according to a new National Retail Federation (NRF) report. The report, "Rethinking Overtime," found that the proposal could cost retailers millions of dollars in added costs and would disproportionally impact retailers operating in rural states.

Bentonville, Ark. – Declining gas prices helped U.S. same-store sales at Wal-Mart Stores Inc., but the negative impact of foreign currency exchange and efforts to improve store experience and employee wages dampened total sales and operating profits.

Atlanta – The Home Depot Inc. benefited from improvements in the housing market and the weather in the first quarter of fiscal 2015. Net earnings increased to $1.58 billion, up 14% from $1.38 billion in the first quarter a year ago.

The Home Depot reported sales of $20.9 billion for the first quarter of fiscal 2015, a 6.1% increase from the first quarter of fiscal 2014.