Marketing Tactics

TAMPA, Fla.— Winn-Dixie Stores announced that beginning Tuesday, guests using the new Winn-Dixie Customer Reward Card (CRC) at any of the grocer’s 95 stores in the Tampa/St. Petersburg, Tallahassee, Gainesville, Fla., Albany and Columbus, Ga. areas, can earn significant fuel discounts at participating Shell stations. The savings are part of Winn-Dixie’s fuelperks! Rewards Program.

Overall, there was an 8 % decline in the number of pages per market across the retailer set, and a 4% decline in number of inserts. Pages being down can be attributed to a steep decline in Kohl’s and Sears' number of pages per market, while the decline in number of inserts was due to Home Depot and Staples decreasing their drops.

Home Depot and Safeway adopted a similar strategy, reducing the number inserts per market in July 2011 compared with last year, while increasing the number of pages per market. 

ENGLEWOOD, Colo. — Children will be returning to school in a matter of weeks, and many of them will be joining or returning to some sort of sporting activity. Enter Sports Authority, which is answering the need for sporting goods by opening six news stores on Aug. 13. The six new stores will open in five states nationwide, in the major markets of Miami, Los Angeles, Salt Lake City, Chicago and Milwaukee, the company reported.

The store locations will be as follows:

• Miami Beach, Fla. at 3401 N. Miami Ave.

Target produced another month of solid same-store sales growth in July and had a lot of good things to say about its future prospects. But judging from the action in the company’s share price in the intervening days, it was as if second-quarter earnings per share had come in well short of analysts’ expectations. Target got caught up in the selling free-for-all that occurred on Friday when it appeared the United States was in for a credit rating downgrade followed by a further acceleration on Monday after the downgrade occurred.

Los Angeles -- American Apparel announced the extension of its partnership with ASOS. The U.K.-based fashion site, which has more than 3.7 million members, has expanded its buy of American Apparel products based on a 100% sell-through rate of a test buy earlier this year.

NEW YORK — Members-only luxury retailer Gilt Groupe announced that it is launching a new standalone website for men. According to the company, Park & Bond (www.parkandbond.com) merges a curated selection of the world's best brands with a continuously updated mix of editorial content designed to give guys the inspiration and advice they need to look their best.

Reston, Va. -- Online U.S. retail spending in second quarter 2011 reached $37.5 billion for the quarter, up 14% versus year ago, comScore reported Monday. This growth rate represented the seventh consecutive quarter of positive year-over-year growth and third consecutive quarter of double-digit growth rates.

GOLDEN, Colo. — Blockbuster Express has teamed up with Boston Market for a dinner and a movie deal. Boston Market will offer a voucher for a one night $1 DVD rental with any meal purchased after 5 p.m.

Now through Sept. 10, the “Dinner & A Movie” deal is offered at Boston Market restaurants nationwide. The offer is valid with a minimum $5 purchase before taxes and only one receipt per total purchase per visit. Users will have until Sept. 30, to use the “Dinner & A Movie” voucher from Blockbuster Express.