Home Depot

Middletown, N.Y. -- National Realty & Development Corp. said that Chipotle Mexican Grill will join Orange Plaza with a new 4,625-sq.-ft. store.

Orange Plaza is an 815,000-sq.-ft. power center located in Middletown, N.Y. and anchored by Walmart Supercenter, Home Depot, Kohl’s, Burlington Coat Factory, Marshalls, Bed Bath and Beyond, and Staples.

DAYTON, Ohio — Interbrand, a consultancy, has named Walmart the most valuable retail brand for 2013. The retailer retained its top spot from 2012.

Rising through the ranks were Macy's, which increased brand value by 62% and moved up nine spots on the list to #40 and Amazon.com, which moved up to #4 on the list, growing brand value by 46%. 

February 2013 marked a declining trend in number of inserts per market for the some retailers, but due to big increases at Macy’s (+48%) and Staples (+100%), the overall count of inserts per market across all retailers was actually up 4.3%. Home Depot (-50.0%) was the only retailer witnessing a major fall, whereas the other retailers showed only minor declines. Of the remaining retailers that did not see a decrease, five had no change in the number of inserts per market, while three (including Macy’s and Staples) increased.

Amazon lead the pack in the retail field on Fortune’s “Most Admired Companies” list. The e-commerce juggernaut was third ranked overall (behind Apple and Google) for, among other reasons, its efficient customer service and leadership under CEO Jeff Bezos.

Nordstrom captured the number 16 spot for generating buzz for its first full-line retail store in Manhattan, well before its planned open date in 2018 and for its successful clearance brand, Nordstrom Rack.

Fourth quarter same store sales at The Home Depot advanced 7% and profits swelled 29% to $1 billion, or 68 cents, compared to profits of $774 million or 50 cents a share the prior year.

Atlanta -- The Home Depot Inc. said Tuesday its fiscal fourth-quarter net income jumped 32%, beating expectations, helped by strong U.S. sales and repairs and cleanup resulting from Superstorm Sandy. The chain also said it will buy back $17 billion of its common stock and boosted its quarterly dividend by 34%.

The year started on a positive note with increases in both number of flyers and pages released to market. More than half of the retailers (56%) maintained previous levels or showed an increase in size of their circulars in January 2013. In addition, the number of inserts per market also showed an increase with almost half (44%) of the advertisers showing a rise in flyer drops for this month. Overall, the number of pages increased slightly (+3.1%), and the number of flyers rose (+8.4%) compared to last year.

Home Depot expects to be busy this spring and is hiring 80,000 seasonal employees, 10,000 more than last year, to keep pace with the demand.

The hiring announcement by Home Depot follows a similar announcement by Lowe’s two weeks earlier that it planned to hire 45,000 seasonal employees. The increased hiring levels suggest the nation’s two largest home improvement retailers are optimistic about consumers demand amid a recovery in the housing market.