Consumer Electronics

Costa Mesa, Calif. -- Ikea said Thursday it has officially plugged-in four Blink Pedestal electric vehicle charging stations at its Costa Mesa, Calif., store as part of its partnership with ECOtality.

The initiative represents the fourth such project for IKEA in the United States.  Installation also is planned at five other IKEA stores in the Western U.S. 

Beaumont, Texas -- Conn’s Inc. reported Thursday that losses in the third quarter widened to $12.7 million from $4.8 million a year ago.

Sales rose 5% to $179.5 million.

The electronics retailer also announced that it made Theodore M. Wright its permanent president and CEO. He had been the company’s interim president and CEO since February 2011.

New York City -- Consumers and their smartphones are becoming inseparable when it comes to shopping, according to a survey by Verve Wireless, a mobile advertising company, which found that over 60% of respondents use their smartphone for shopping one or more times each month.

The top three product categories shopped for on smartphones are electronics (51%), entertainment (50%), books (45%), closely followed by clothing (38%) and automotive (21%), the survey revealed.

In other findings:

BENTON HARBOR, Mich. — Whirlpool Corp. is launching Affresh Cleaners, a new line of advanced home cleaning products now available at Best Buy stores nationwide.

"Keeping the kitchen clean has historically been a big chore, so we designed the new line of Affresh Cleaners to combat everyday spills and residue while making cleaning simple," said Wendeline Ortiz, brand manager of Affresh Cleaners.

The new line includes:

Chicago -- With the holiday season in full swing, Mintel, a leading global supplier of consumer, product and media intelligence, has looked into its market intelligence to find out just what U.S. consumers do to make their holidays special.

Here are 10 interesting insights:
 
• Some 13% of U.S. consumers think a cell phone is a good gift for children aged 6-11, up from just 4% earlier this year.

Yonkers, N.Y. -- Despite flagging consumer confidence, December's Consumer Reports Index, a measure of overall consumer financial health, showed that the holiday season is off to a good start, with excellent activity in November and the prospect of a strong December.

The Past 30-Day Retail Index for December was 13.9, up from 12.4 a year ago, and planned spending for December was also strong at 12.7 compared to 11.8 last year. Among the categories comprising the Retail Index, the largest gains were in personal electronics.

Well, another Black Friday has come and gone. And, much to the surprise of many (myself included), it did so with a bang. General consensus is that the Black Friday sales bonanza was a rousing success, and the numbers certainly support that: ShopperTrak reported that Black Friday sales increased 6.6% over the 2010 numbers, with a record-breaking $11.4 billion in purchases. More people were out and about — foot traffic reports show an increase of about 5% over last year, which is good news for the brick and mortar guys.

By Tom Mullaney, [email protected]