JCPenney Co.

J.C. Penney is in the final phase of its turnaround and the company’s stores are customers’ preferred destination for great style, quality and value, according to company CEO Mike Ullman.

Those comments came after J.C. Penney said its third quarter same store sales were flat and it forecast a fourth quarter comp increase of 2% to 4%. Total sales in the quarter ended Nov. 1 declined slightly to $2.76 billion from $2.78 billion.

Plano, Texas -– Amid restrained consumer spending and warmer weather that dulled sales of seasonal merchandise, JCPenney Co. Inc. managed to shrink its third quarter net loss more than Wall Street expected in the third quarter of fiscal 2014, but missed projections with weaker-than-expected net sales.  

Former J.C. Penney CEO Ron Johnson is back in the game. Johnson, who prior to joining Penney headed up Apple’s retail store operations for nearly 12 years, is launching a new company — called Enjoy — and contrary to earlier rumors, it’s not an on-demand tech-gadget delivery service. Instead, it’s a service to help online shoppers make the right product choices.

Johnson isn’t divulging much about his new start-up, or exactly what it will offer.

Plano, Texas -- The J.C. Penney Co. Inc. will open stores and begin its Black Friday sale activities at 5 p.m. local time on Thanksgiving Day. The company announced its plans via a tweet on the official JCPenney news account.   This start time is an hour earlier than the 6 p.m. Thanksgiving opening time of competing department stores Macy’s and Sears, and three hours earlier than the 8 p.m. opening time Penney used for Thanksgiving 2013.   

New York -- The cat is finally out of the bag. Former J.C. Penney CEO and Apple retail head Ron Johnson confirmed that he is launching a new company—but it’s not a tech-gadget delivery service as was widely rumored. Instead,  the new initiative, set to launch in 2015,  is designed to help online hoppers make the right product choices.  

Veteran Home Deport operations executive Marc Powers has been elevated to the role of EVP of U.S. stores as part of an ongoing leadership transformation.

Few people know Home Depot from the ground up the way Powers does. He began his career with the company in 1986 as an hourly employee and over the course of the past 28 years served as store manager, district manager and regional vice president. He most recently served as SVP of operations for the company’s nearly 2,000 U.S. stores.

Atlanta -- The Home Depot announced that it has named Marc Powers executive VP, U.S. stores, effective Nov. 1, 2014. He replaces Marvin Ellison, who was recently named president and CEO designee of J.C. Penney Co.  

By Gary Ambrosino, President and CEO of TimeTrade   Hidden in the onslaught of negative headlines about former retail heavyweights, like JC Penney and Sears, is a slew of less-publicized, good news from smaller—many formerly online-only—retailers that are not only weathering the storm but are thriving.