Apparel

American Apparel is looking to make the final step in the path to in-store purchase safer, easier and more efficient.

The specialty apparel chain is deploying a cloud-based payments infrastructure from retail software provider Index. Leveraging the Index Hosted Gateway and Semi-Integrated Payments solutions, American Apparel will obtain the ability to secure card payments at the POS with both point-to-point encryption (P2PE) and EMV authentication. This will validate the cardholder at the moment of transaction and then protect their data as it is processed.

Nordstrom Rack is coming to Memphis.

The off-price retailer plans to open a 33,000-sq.-ft. store at Poplar Commons in Memphis, in the fall of 2017. The store is leased from Seritage Growth Properties who is replacing an existing Sears building with a 135,000-sq.-ft. shopping center.

“We're excited to bring our first Nordstrom Rack to Memphis and can't wait to open our doors in 2017," said Geevy Thomas, president of Nordstrom Rack.

Sports Authority Inc., which is reportedly preparing to file for bankruptcy, has discussed selling stores and intellectual property to rival chain Dick’s Sporting Goods Inc. and other parties, according to Bloomberg.

Sports Authority, once the largest sporting-goods retailer in the U.S., is heading toward default after years of losing ground to competitors. The Englewood, Colorado-based chain missed a Jan. 15 interest payment on some of its debt and failed to make the payment during a 30-day grace period.

Phillips Edison Grocery Center REIT II announced the strategic acquisitions of four grocery-anchored shopping centers in Colorado, Florida and California.

Charleston, S.C. -- Faison Enterprises announced it broke ground on its new mixed-use development, located in Daniel Island’s Town Center, Charleston, South Carolina. The project will include 317 luxury apartment units along with nearly 30,000 sq. ft. of restaurant and retail space.

Ross Stores reported strong results for its fourth quarter. But similar to many other retailers, the off-price retailer sounded a cautious note with regards to sales and earnings for its new fiscal year.

Ross on Tuesday reported earnings per share for the fourth quarter ended January 30, 2016 of $.66, up 10% from the prior year, on net earnings that rose 6% to a better-than-expected $264 million.

A new form of wage theft has recently been identified, where employers misclassify employees’ schedules in order to shift the business expenses associated with scheduling to the employee. Illegal misclassification schemes have been around for decades. A common example is an employer misclassifying an employee’s job title, so that the employee is a salaried employee, in order to avoid paying the employee overtime. Here, the employers are misclassifying the employee’s schedules, instead of the employee’s job title, to avoid paying reporting time premiums.

The expanded Disney Springs (formerly called Downtown Disney) center in Lake Buena Vista, Fla., unveiled 30 new retail tenants that will be moving in when the project is completed.