Corporate Governance

Staples' secret weapon this back-to-school season looks to be Katy Perry. The retailer recently aligned itself with the pop mega-star who has the potential to influence the shopping behavior of 50 million Twitter followers and 71 million Facebook fans.

Staples said it will be the presenting sponsor of the North American leg of Perry’s Prismatic World tour when it resumes on June 22 in Raleigh, N.C., and also donated $1 million to the DonorsChoose.org charitable organization which helps fund teachers’ and students’ classroom needs.

It looks like Sycamore Partners, which owns approximately 9.9% of Express’ outstanding shares, is interested in acquiring the retailer.

Express confirmed that it has received a letter from Sycamore and has established a special committee of the board to determine a course of action that serves the best interest of all stockholders. The retailer has also engaged Perella Weinberg Partners LP and Sullivan & Cromwell LLP as advisers to itself and the special committee.

GNC financial chief and EVP Michael M. Nuzzo is exiting the company to take an executive position at a private equity funded consumer products company.

Nuzzo will remain with the company at least through July 18, which will include preparation of its second quarter earnings release and 10Q, both of which are expected to be issued on the normal schedule in late July or early August.

With an 18% same store sales increase and a 217% profit improvement in the first quarter no wonder Restoration Hardware is looking to add 31 new stores to its 69 current locations.

The company is on track to open stores in Los Angeles and Atlanta later this year and is adding two floors to its top-performing store in New York. In addition, Restoration Hardware chairman and CEO Gary Friedman said the company has signed leases for six of its stores called “next-generation full line design galleries,” and is in negotiations for 25 additional locations.

The drought’s effect on fresh produce in California and the timing of this year’s Easter holiday adversely affected 99 Cents Only Stores’ comparable-store sales in the first quarter of fiscal 2015.

Same-store sales decreased 0.5%, calculated on a comparable 13-week period of the prior year. The company reported net sales of $477.9 million, an increase of 7% from $445.2 million in the first quarter of fiscal 2014.

Newell Rubbermaid president and CEO Michael Polk has joined the board of directors of Colgate-Palmolive. The move comes a little more than a month after the CPG company’s shareholders elected a slate of 10 directors.

All 10 members of Target’s board of directors were re-elected at the retailer’s annual meeting on June 11, but there was strong opposition to several members and a proposal requiring an independent chairman nearly passed.

By Jules Polonetsky, executive director, Future of Privacy Forum

In mid- May, over 30,000 professionals from the shopping center industry gathered in Las Vegas for the ICSC’s annual RECon event.

In addition to discussing leasing and the state of the retail market, for the first the first time a new topic was on the agenda – consumer privacy.

New York — Target Corp. is introducing a new policy by imposing new rules on the cleaning companies it hires to clean its stores in the Minneapolis-St. Paul area, Businessweek reported.

Seattle — Amazon.com has debuted a new feature for members of its Prime paid benefits program called Prime Music. The service provides ad-free access to more than one million songs and hundreds of expert-programmed Prime Playlists.