Consumer Attitudes & Behavior

San Jose, California – U.S. shopping trends showed some improvement in July 2014, although not all metrics experienced positive change, compared to the same month a year earlier. According to the RetailNext Insights Report of more than 13 million shopping trips in July 2014, sales per shopper increased 3.5% from July 2013.

Boise, Idaho - More than half of back-to-school shoppers will not purchase computers this year. According to the Crucial.com Back-to-School Shopping Report, which includes responses from 1,000 adults in the U.S., found that 57% of respondents do not plan to purchase laptops, desktops, tablets, or mobile devices for school this year, as a vast majority of consumers are increasingly concerned with becoming more frugal.

San Francisco – The Grand Cities Mall in Grand Forks, North Dakota leads all U.S. shopping malls in both the presence of shoppers who live and the presence of shoppers who work within three miles.

Atlanta - Retail spending growth was at an 11-month high in July as summer vacation travel led strong spending during the month, according to data reported by payment technology and services provider First Data Corporation. The First Data SpendTrend analysis looked at the period July 1 through 31, 2014, compared to July 2 through Aug. 1, 2013.

A new partnership with Hendrick Motorsports has 3M off to the races. The company has signed a three-year contract to become the primary sponsor of NASCASR driver Jeff Gordon’s No. 24 car, starting in 2015.
 
The brand will use its sponsorship — which includes 11 Sprint Cup races every year — in product launches and promotions.
 

Retail spending growth was at an 11-month high in July and consumers turned to planes, trains and automobiles as summer vacation travel led strong spending during the month, according to data reported today by First Data Corporation, a leading global payment technology and services company.

Dole Fresh Fruit’s sales and marketing team will be taking a trip to Kannapolis, North Carolina, to see the company’s Nutrition Research Laboratory on the state’s research campus.
 
The visitors will be led by Dole’s VP of nutrition research Nicholas Gillitt, who will show them around the campus and explain research in the hope that the marketing team will pass it on to consumers.
 

New York -- The latest SpendingPulse report from MasterCard showed that U.S. retail sales rose 4.6% year-over-year in July, the largest year-over-year gain since October 2012.

Lodging, Airlines and Restaurants were among the top categories for U.S. retail sales last month, while Automotive, Grocery and Luxury items (excluding Jewelry) were less sought after by consumers.

Austin, Texas -- A Shoppers Trend report released by RetailMeNot found that, once kids leave the nest, parents are just as ready as their kids to start a new chapter in life. In fact, nearly three-in-four parents (74%) surveyed indicated they would do things differently once their kids leave the house, with traveling (42%), spending time with friends (37%) and pampering themselves (33%) topping the list of changes.

Cleveland -- WorkPlace Impact found in a recent survey that 49% of working female consumers are making millions of trips between Monday and Friday. What’s more, 46% of the women that WorkPlace Impact surveyed reported that they regularly purchase groceries on their way to or from the office or during a lunch break.

Further affirming that working women often have groceries on their mind during the workday, the study also found that 84.4% of the women surveyed said they regularly or occasionally add items to their grocery shopping lists at work.