Corporate Governance

Increased traffic gave a boost to Kohl's, which reported sales and earnings that topped analysts’ estimates in the second quarter.   The company's net income rose to $208 million, or $1.24 per share, in the quarter ended July 29, from $140 million, or 77 cents per share, in the year-ago period.  

The Ivanka Trump brand is making its second foray into freestanding retail.   The company will open a location in Trump Tower on Manhattan’s Fifth Avenue this fall, giving the tourists who visit the site a chance to buy Ivanka Trump-branded merchandise, Bloomberg reported.    The brand previously had a jewelry shop in Manhattan, which closed in 2015. It also shuttered its only other location, a luxury shop in Beijing.  

At Home Group continues to expand its store network in the Lone Star state.    The fast-growing retailer announced the grand openings of three locations in the greater Houston area, including a newly redeveloped store in Katy, Texas, that opens on July 19. Construction is underway on stores in Pearland and Richmond, Texas, that are slated to open in the fall. The Katy location is one of seven At Home stores in the greater Houston area, and one of 26 in Texas.   

As more retailers begin to adopt the Bonobos-style showroom store as their brick-and-mortar strategies, will bike garages become a new fixture in malls and shopping centers?   If so, the city of Utrecht in the Netherlands might prove the design test case. It just opened the first phase of what will be the world’s largest bike garage at the Central Train Station, a 184,000-sq.-ft. space capable of holding 12,500 bikes at full build-out.  

A premium outerwear best known for its signature goose-down jacket with fur-trimmed hood is expanding its fledgling store footprint.    Canada Goose Holdings Inc. announced plans to open three additional retail stores this fall, with locations in Boston, Calgary (Canada), and Tokyo, Japan. Also opening this fall are two previously announced stores in Chicago and London.   

After a torrid opening quarter, Macy's second quarter numbers come as a relief. Certainly, a same-store sales decline of 2.8% is far from good, but it is one of the better performances Macy's has turned in over recent periods. Of course, the question is whether this gentler decline represents a genuine turning point for Macy's, or whether it is simply a bottoming out after years of sharp deterioration.  

Oregon has become the first state in the nation to pass legislation that puts an end to on-call scheduling by guaranteeing hourly employees advance notice of their work schedules.  

The month of July saw a big turnover at the top.