Strategy

Don’t be fooled by Costco’s tepid sales growth and first quarter profit decline. The company is accelerating expansion and pursuing some intriguing digital partnerships while members continue to renew at record rates.

While same-store sales at Dollar General and Dollar Tree have decelerated of late, that is not the case with Canada’s largest dollar store operator which recently opened its 1,000th location.

JLL has entered into an agreement to acquire Big Red Rooster, a brand experience and retail design services company based in Columbus, Ohio.

The acquisition, expected to close in January 2016, will expand JLL’s project management and design services with dedicated brand experience and design experts who can serve a broad mix of retail, food service, grocery and healthcare companies across the United States.

Big Red Rooster counts Under Armour, FedEx, T-Mobile, American Express and Nationwide Children’s Hospital among its clients.

PGA Tour Superstore in 2016 will open its fourth store in the state of Arizona, in Tucson. Additional 2016 openings are to be announced.

The retailer will open a 25,000-sq.-ft. store at the Tucson Fiesta Shopping Center. The store will have multiple state-of-the-art swing simulators, practice hitting bays, a large putting green and an in-house club making and repair facility to provide a unique, interactive experience to golf enthusiasts of all levels.

Women’s lifestyle brand and retailer Vera Bradley is the latest company to feel the negative sales effects of weaning shoppers off promotions, but the strategic shift has done wonders for the company’s bottom line.

Douglas Tompkins, co-founder of The North Face and an ardent conservationist and outdoorsman, died following a kayaking accident in his adopted country of Chile. Tomkins, 72, was the co-founder of two clothing companies that would grow into multi-billion dollar enterprises. In addition to North Face, he was a co-founder, along with his wife at the time, of Esprit. “He flew airplanes, he climbed to the top of mountains all over the world,” his daughter Summer Tompkins Walker told the New York Times.

While athleisure apparel is still quite trendy these days, the creator of the trend, Lululemon Athletica, is struggling to grow profits as competitors threaten its value proposition.

For the third quarter ended Nov. 1, the company posted a profit of $53.2 million, or 38 cents a share, down from $60.5 million, or 42 cents a share, a year earlier. Revenue rose 14% to $479.8 million. Same store sales rose 6% for the second quarter in a row on a constant-currency basis.

Executives from Staples and virtual reality firm Magic Leap have joined the strategic advisory board of leading online handbags, luggage and backpacks retailer eBags.

Mike Edwards, eBags president and CEO, said Faisal Masud, executive VP of global e-commerce at Staples, and Scott Henry, CFO at Magic Leap, would bring a wealth of wealth of entrepreneurial and operational experience and an understanding of what it takes to excel in a fast-paced technology to eBags as the newest members of the board.

Doug Tompkins, the founder of the North Face and Esprit apparel companies, died Tuesday in a kayaking accident in Chile. He was 72.

Tompkins was boating with others on a lake in Chile when his kayak capsized. Tompkins was rescued but spent a lengthy amount of time in the freezing water. He died of hypothermia in a hospital in Coyhaique.

Tompkins founded The North Face in 1964 as an outdoor outfitter and in 1968 he co-founded Esprit clothing, which would grow to do a billion dollars in sales. 

Women’s lifestyle brand and retailer Vera Bradley is the latest company to feel the negative sales effects of weaning shoppers off promotions, but the strategic shift has done wonders for the company’s bottom line.