Events

Online retail sales continue to grow as changing shopper behavior places greater expectations on brick-and-mortar retail. Despite this trend, store-based retailing remains more profitable than direct-to-consumer retailing, largely due to the high cost of free shipping and returns associated with online sales.   

Best Buy has opened a pop-up dedicated to smart technology products for the home in the rotunda of the nation’s largest mall.   

Online and catalog retailer Garnet Hill is taking a curated collection of its aspirationally styled home and apparel goods on the road with a mobile pop-up boutique.   The experience, created from a converted shipping container, resembles a natural home environment – except that it's shop-able. The mobile pop-up will launch at Garnet Hill headquarters in Franconia, New Hampshire, moving south through New Hampshire, and completing its summer tour in New York City.    

Walmart, along with organizations around the world, has teamed up with personal care brand Always to contribute to the goal of keeping girls in sports with a new campaign.   The Always #LikeAGirl – Keep Playing program will partner with UN Women to help girls build and maintain their confidence through sports. In the U.S., Always will support Girls on the Run programs and work with Walmart to help keep girls in sports.  

A curated selection of Sony entertainment products and technologies — some of which are still in the prototype stage — are on display at the new Sony Square NYC.    Located in the company's New York City headquarters on Madison Avenue, the 2,400-sq.-ft. store also will host consumer events, including photography classes, exclusive movie screenings and invitation-only performances by Sony Music artists.  

Uniqlo is in the final stages of an extensive makeover of its first-ever store in New York City.      Located in Manhattan’s Soho neighborhood, the 10-year-old, 36,000-sq.-ft. store is being redone to the theme of "a new Tokyo in Soho." Scheduled to unveil its new look on Sept. 2, the store was the chain’s first global flagship. Hiroshi Taki, Uniqlo U.S.A. CEO, described it as “an important milestone in the company's plans to expand internationally.”  

Grandin Road will step into the physical space in what promises to be a frightening debut.   The direct retailer of home furnishings and décor will open a Halloween pop-up at Macy’s flagship in Herald Square in New York City. The 1,400-sq.-ft. shop will showcase Grandin Road’s Halloween decoration collection, which has grown steadily over the past decade.  

The first phase of NewMark Merrill’s redevelopment of the Village at the Peaks in Longmont, Colorado — a 500,000-sq.-ft. lifestyle center — has been completed.   The company purchased the 50% vacant Twin Peaks Mall in 2012 for $8.5 million and has since pumped $90 million into construction of the new project in a private partnership with the city of Longmont that included a $32 million public bond.