Marketing Tactics

MOVING DIRT
Major shopping center openings in 2014 beg the question, “Are we back on track?”

Last year may be the first 365-day period since the Great Recession that there is enough new shopping center space to crow about.

Chain Store Age’s annual development survey — spanning 26 years — reported pretty spotty new-build efforts from 2009 to 2013, but in 2014 some significant projects opened.
BEACONS AT YOUR COMMAND
GameStop uses beacons to put customers in charge of store promotions

Retailers often use in-store beacons to push promotions to customer mobile phones as they pass by. But video game retailer GameStop Corp., which operates more than 4,200 U.S. stores, takes a different approach.

“In the store, we have multiple pieces of signage marking the location of beacons,” said Charlie Larkin, senior director of GameStop Technology Institute, the retailer’s in-house IT development center.

GNC has weak Q1

Pittsburgh – GNC Holdings Inc. demonstrated some weakness during the first quarter of fiscal 2015 with shrinking profit and revenue. Net income dropped 9% to $63.27 million from $69.9 million a year earlier, driven by rising selling, general and administrative (SG&A) expenses.

Net revenue fell slightly to $670.25 million from $674.46 million. Same-store sales decreased 4.1% in domestic company-owned stores (including GNC.com sales). In domestic franchise locations, same-store sales decreased 1.5%.
Whole Foods partners with Instacart for Mother’s Day delivery

Austin, Texas - Whole Foods Market and Instacart are partnering to make it more convenient to show Mom how much you love her this Mother’s Day. Using the Instacart service, Whole Foods will deliver flowers in as little as one hour across 15 major U.S. metros, along with a selection of other gifts.
West Marine slightly shrinks loss in Q1

Watsonville, Calif. – West Marine Inc. slightly shrunk its net loss to $10.3 million in the first quarter of fiscal 2015 from $11.4 million in the same period a year earlier. Cost of goods sold and selling, general and administrative (SG&A) expenses combined to total more than net revenues.
Tech Guest Viewpoint: Five Things to Consider for SKU Onboarding

By Mihir Kittur, co-founder and chief innovation officer, Ugam

2015 is seeing enormous growth in the number of product SKUs listed online, and e-commerce and content managers will be tasked with the rapid onboarding of those SKUs. However, adding SKUs alone won’t be enough; they also need to have the right assortment and the right price and deliver a better shopper experience.
North Face enhancing in-store experience with virtual reality

New York -- Outdoor apparel, equipment and footwear retailer The North Face has collaborated with Jaunt, which provides virtual reality (VF) hardware and software, on an immersive VR in-store experience designed to boost customers’ connection to the outdoors.

The attraction arrived in select North Face locations beginning in March in Chicago, and is now being rolled out to the company’s store in Manhattan. It transports viewers to Yosemite National Park and Moab, Utah, alongside North Face global athletes Cedar Wright and Sam Elias.
True Religion opens digitally enhanced flagship in Manhattan

Vernon, Calif. -- True Religion Apparel Inc. has opened its first global flagship, at 513 Broadway in downtown Manhattan. The 3,000-sq.-ft. space is the brand’s largest and most digitally-savvy store to date, starting with storefront windows that display a continuous stream of video content. The windows are also able to showcase style statements from shoppers themselves.

Inside the store, digital kiosks and iPads provide product-on-demand by offering the entire True Religion collection through an endless digital aisle.
JCPenney growing its Sephora presence

JCPenney Co. Inc. is expanding its in-store partnership with Sephora by adding the beauty retailer to more stores.
Celebrate Mother's Day with Whole Foods delivery

Whole Foods Market and Instacart are partnering to make it more convenient to show Mom how much you love her this Mother’s Day.
Kroger's SoCal stores ask shoppers to give

The Food 4 Less and Ralph’s divisions of Kroger Co. are asking shoppers in the Southern California area to support the Special Olympics.

The 2015 Special Olympics World Games are coming to Los Angeles this summer, and Ralphs customers and associates can show their support of Special Olympics through the supermarket chain's nonprofit arm, The Ralphs Fund, by donating their spare change in collection canisters located at the checkstands in their neighborhood Ralphs supermarket.
WMT exec to offer Savings Catcher insight

With the one year anniversary of Walmart’s Saving Catcher app approaching, the executive who led its development is slated to give an update on what’s next for the price comparison app at a May 14 event in Bentonville.

Greg Chandler, senior marketing director of customer engagement at Walmart, is the featured speaker at an upcoming meeting of Doing Business in Bentonville. Chandler is scheduled to speak on the topic of “Walmart mobile retail – how Savings Catcher is changing the way Walmart things about digital retail.”