Research Topic

According to Deloitte’s annual retail holiday sales forecast, steadily improving economic fundamentals should moderately boost holiday sales in stores and online this year.

Stamford, Conn. -- Half of Americans (49%) plan to shop online earlier for gifts this holiday season, with the main reason being to ensure they receive their packages on time (63%), according to a survey by Pitney Bowes.

New York -- Target Canada is aggressively repositioning to drive its price value, according to a basket pricing study by Kantar Retail.

“Target’s price leadership in Canada has clearly shifted,” noted Robin Sherk, director of retail insights, Kantar Retail, and contributor to the study. “We found that the price of Target Canada’s overall basket was 3.9% less expensive than Walmart’s. In our initial study, the retailers’ basket values were effectively even.”

PayItSimple, a new service that lets consumers charge any purchase on their existing credit cards and pay it back in monthly, interest free installments, has launched in the United States.

PayItSimple supports an omnichannel shopping experience and is available for e-commerce, brick-and-mortar, mobile and all other payment platforms.

Mahwah, N.J. -- Ascena Retail Group Inc. on Monday reported fourth-quarter net earnings of $15.7 million, compared with $29.8 million in the year-ago period. Its results missed Wall Street expectations.

Revenues for the quarter were $1.18 billion, compared with $1.20 billion in the prior year. The company attributed the decrease challenging tween market conditions at Justice and inventory-related issues at Lane Bryant. Results were partially offset by positive comp growth at Maurices and Catherines and new store growth at Maurices.

New York -- British supermarket retailer Tesco suspended four executives, including its U.K. managing director, after revealing that its half-year profit was overstated by $407 million, the BBC reported. The retailer has launched an investigation headed by Deloitte.

Tesco CEO Dave Lewis, who took over the struggling company in September, said the decision to ask employees to stand aside was not an indication of guilt or that disciplinary action was warranted. He declined to speculate on what the investigation might turn up.

By Gary Lee, InReality

New York -- Nearly three-quarters (74%) of U.S. households plan to spend money on Halloween-related items, according to the International Council of Shopping Centers (ICSC) Halloween Consumer Spending Survey. The total for Halloween-related spending is expected to be approximately $11.3 billion in 2014.

Tel Aviv, Israel - Default image formats, used by up to 95% of all websites, do not deliver the highest level of user satisfaction. According to a new study of moment-by-moment emotional responses in universal facial expressions of more than 250 participants conducted by NeuroStrata on behalf of application delivery/security provider Radware, 65% of participants have felt frustrated by images taking too long to load.

Hoffman Estates, Ill. – A $400 million loan Eddie Lampert, the CEO and largest shareholder of Sears Holdings Corp., is making to Sears this month reportedly is only enough to last the struggling retailer for three months. According to Bloomberg, global ratings agency Fitch Ratings is projecting that Sears will need $4 billion in capital to avoid running out of cash altogether in 2016.