Target, Inc.

Store pickup at Target, Best Buy and other major retailers is getting a boost from a whole new innovation from tech startup Curbside.

The company, which has partnered with these retailers to provide a curbside pickup app for its customers, has unveiled its first ever Curbside Pickup Pod at the Glendale Galleria mall in Southern California.

Westlake Village, Calif. – Target Corp. may be exiting the pharmacy business, but the retailer is doing so on a high note.

According to the new 2015 U.S. Pharmacy Study from J.D. Power, Target, which in June announced it would sell its pharmacy business to CVS Health for $1.9 billion and rebrand its nearly 1,700 prescription departments as CVS/pharmacy, ranked highest among mass merchandiser pharmacies.

Later this year, Target will begin rolling out a key program that will enhance inventory visibility and accuracy in a way that the chain store giant hopes will “work its magic in the background to provide people with a seamless, stress-free shopping experience,” as the announcement from its corporate blog stated back in May.

Thanks to some financial engineering, Sears Holdings overcame a double digit decline in same store sales to produce a second quarter profit or a less severe loss depending on the arithmetic used.

Target’s better than expected second quarter profits, same store sales, rate of e-commerce growth and an increased full year forecast stood in sharp contrast to the disappointing results Walmart reported a day earlier.

Minneapolis – Target Corp. exceeded Wall Street projections with net earnings of $753 million in the second quarter of fiscal 2015, a 221% increase from $234 million the same period the prior fiscal year. Declining selling, general and administrative (SG&A) expenses and loss from discontinued operations helped boost profits as sales climbed.

Target reported net sales of $17.4 billion, up 2.8% over the same period last year.

In today’s news cycle, it’s become somewhat standard fare to read reports of a significant breach in the retail world. From Target to Neiman Marcus, UPS to eBay and even restaurants like P.F. Chang's and Dairy Queen, 2014 resulted in major retail breaches totaling 100 million credit cards and 313 million personal records. But it’s not just the big names that have targets on their backs; as Verizon’s 2015 Data Breach Investigations Report details: “the attack methods are becoming more varied, even against small businesses.”

Minneapolis – Target Corp. has reportedly reached a settlement with Visa Inc. that will reimburse issuers of Visa cards for costs related to the retailer’s 2013 data breach. According to the Wall Street Journal, the agreement will reimburse thousands of card issuers for potentially up to $67 million.