Consumer Electronics

New York City -- Electronic Arts, the Redwood City, Calif.-based sports video game developer, will make its freestanding retail debut this fall, opening an EA Sports store in North Carolina’s Charlotte/Douglas International Airport.

The company is looking to open at least two additional stores in the next year.

Walmart attracted nearly 33.6 million unique visitors to its website in May, earning the company the 29th spot on comScore’s monthly ranking of the top 50 U.S. web properties. That sounds like a lot of traffic, but 7th ranked Amazon.com drew nearly three times that level with 94.9 million unique visitors. Other notable, retail-oriented companies and their rank included 13th ranked Apple, with 70.3 million unique visitors, 14th ranked eBay, with 67.2 million unique visitors and 20th ranked Craigslist, with 51.8 million unique visitors.

Minneapolis -- Elaborating on previously announced plans to downsize its brick-and-mortar footprint, Best Buy CEO Brian Dunn said this week that the electronics retailer is launching plans to wall off parts of its big-box stores and sublease the space to smaller retailers, such as grocers, beauty supply stores, home furnishing outlets and others.

New York City -- Do you think Apple retail guru Ron Johnson will transform J.C. Penney Co.?

Click here to register your opinion with the Chain Store Age poll.

NEW YORK  — Samsung Electronics America has launched a first-of-its kind LCD refrigerator complete with apps for keeping track of recipes, schedules and more. 

The Samsung refrigerator includes the following apps:

• Recipes from Epicurious

• Organizational tools from Google Calendar

•  Notepad

• Entertainment from Pandora

• Photos from Picasa Web Albums

Minneapolis -- Best Buy Co. said Tuesday that it will buy back $5 billion of its common stock and raise its quarterly dividend by 7%.

The retailer said that the buyback replaces a $5.5 billion repurchase program that had about $800 million left as of May 28. The announcement came just ahead of its shareholders meeting in Richfield, Minn.

It was the biggest story in the retail world last week when JCPenney announced it had hired Ron Johnson as its new CEO with the incoming executive vowing to transform the way America shops by reinventing the department store. Such statements normally elicit a yawn because they are so common, but Johnson is the former SVP retail at Apple and spent the past 11 years overseeing the development and growth of the company’s wildly successful and widely heralded retail operation.