Research Topic

ATLANTA -- Newell Rubbermaid announced it will reaffirm its fiscal year 2013 outlook, as provided in its fourth quarter 2012 earnings press release dated Feb.1, 2013, during its presentation Thursday at the Consumer Analyst Group of New York (CAGNY) conference.

The company’s guidance and key assumptions for the full year 2013 are as follows:

• Core sales increase of 2% to 4%.

• Net sales are expected to grow 1% to 3%

Washington, D.C. -- Nearly three-quarters (73.3%) of consumers say their spending plans are taking a hit due to the recent payroll tax changes, according to NRF’s 2013 Tax Returns Survey conducted by BIGinsight.
 
When asked how the new federal tax laws have affected spending, saving or budgeting of their households, nearly six in 10 (58.2%) of those polled say their plans have been either somewhat or greatly impacted. Specifically, nearly half (45.7%) say they will spend less overall, and 35.6% will watch for sales more often.
 

Dallas -- Corner Bakery Café said Wednesday it plans to open 18 restaurants in the Boston area, joining under-development markets in neighboring Connecticut, Rhode Island, New York, New Jersey and Pennsylvania.

The bakery-café concept is targeting its growth through franchising deals with restaurant pros capable of opening multiple units. Corner Bakery has set a goal of doubling its current U.S. footprint of 147 locations by the end of 2015.

PORT WASHINGTON — Despite a plethora of constantly changing products, the consumer technology industry saw its sales decline 2% in 2012, according to The NPD Group. This is on top of the less than 1% drop in 2011. Since 2010, consumer technology sales have declined by $4 billion.

Houston -- A report released Tuesday by research company NPD Group found that the convenience store sector experienced marked gains last year, as visits increased 4.6% in the fourth quarter and grew an average of 3.7% per month for 2012.

Traffic gains were spread among all type of c-stores, according to NPD’s Convenience Store Monitor, which tracks the consumer purchasing behavior of more than 51,000 convenience store shoppers in the U.S.  

The second and third largest players in the office retail space could soon join forces. According to published reports,OfficeMax and Office Depot could announce a merger this week.

The rumors have gotten Wall Street buzzing as pre-market trading saw shares of Office Depot and OfficeMax up 28.5% and 20%, respectively.

New York -- Office Depot and OfficeMax are in talks to merge, according to reports by the Wall Street Journal and Bloomberg.

The retailers are discussing as potential stock swap that would result in a single company with nearly $18 billion in revenue, reports said. The combined company would be better positioned to take on Staples, Walmart and other competitors.

RESTON, Va. — In terms of growth, clicks continued to outpace bricks in 2012 — and how!

That was the key takeaway from comScore’s “2013 U.S. Digital Future in Focus” report: Despite the backdrop of continued economic uncertainty, 2012 was a strong year for retail e-commerce. Throughout the year, growth rates versus the prior year remained in the mid-teens to outpace growth at brick-and-mortar retail by a factor of approximately four times.