Home Depot

Atlanta – The Home Depot has acquired Houston-based window coverings retailer Blinds.com. As The Home Depot continues to implement its interconnected retail strategy, the company will work with Blinds.com to expand its technology into Homedepot.com and the company's stores with the goal of improving the entire end-to-end buying process for window coverings.

The Blinds.com management team and staff will remain intact at its headquarters in Houston. The acquisition closed Jan. 23 and terms of the deal were not disclosed.

The Home Depot has acquired Blinds.com, the Houston-based online window coverings retailer.

In explaining the appeal of the partnership, Home Depot cited Blinds.com's integrated user experience, on-demand staff and knowledge base.

Target is the latest major retailer to announce it will stop offering health insurance to its part-time employees. In a company blog post on Jan. 21, Target said it will no longer provide health insurance coverage to part time workers after April 1.

Minneapolis – Target Corp. is the latest major retailer to announce it will stop offering health insurance to its part-time employees. In a company blog post on Jan. 21, Target said it will no longer provide health insurance coverage to part time workers after April 1, 2014.

Perhaps no single brand had a holiday season quite as rocky as Sears. When the retailer announced a string of bad news on Jan. 9, shares of Sears Holding Corp. (which includes both Sears and Kmart) went through the floor. Holiday sales at Sears stores were down 9.2% in the nine weeks prior to Jan. 6, a brutal figure when you consider that overall retail sales were up slightly over the holidays (which I’ll discuss more in my next column).

Oakbrook Terrace, Ill. — Mid-America Real Estate Corp. has brokered the sale of two centers on behalf of Retail Properties of America.
 
First, Phillips Edison & Company purchased the 134,229-sq.-ft. Duck Creek Plaza in Bettendorf, Iowa, for $19.7 million. Schnucks and Marshalls anchor Duck Creek Plaza, and Home Depot serves as a shadow anchor. Mid-America Real Estate Corp. in cooperation with Mid-America Real Estate — Iowa LLC brokered the transaction exclusively on behalf of RPAI.

ECRM compared retail circular advertising in December 2012 versus December 2013 and noted trends occurring across top retail chains. Last year, Home Depot did not run any circular promotions for the month of December and instead chose to coast on Web and email promotions. These electronic offers featured 50%-off promotions, as well as one-day-only sales. Although this online-only behavior was not repeated, Web and email remained Home Depot’s main focus: a short circular with a four day duration was run on Dec. 1 with a Cyber Monday theme.

Chicago — Cole Real Estate has purchased Darien Towne Centre in Darien, Ill., for $22.25 million, according to Transwestern’s Chicago office, which brokered the transaction on behalf of the seller, RPAI.

Cole has the ability to expand the 177,002-sq.-ft. center, which was developed in 1994, by up to 12,000 sq. ft.

Home Depot anchors Darien Towne Center, and a Wal-Mart Supercenter shadow-anchors. National tenants include PetSmart, O’Reilly Automotive, TGI Friday’s, Great Clips, Jenny Craig and Sally Beauty Supply.