Convenience Stores

More California Walmart stores add curbside grocery pickup
Walmart’s grocery pickup service is available to even more shoppers in the Golden State. The discounter introduced grocery pickup in 26 stores across Inland Empire, Los Angeles and San Diego, bringing the total number of stores statewide offering the service to 36 locations, according to The Orange County Register. Each store will designate parking stalls for shoppers to retrieve their groceries.
Louisiana center changes hands
Kimco Realty has sold the Ambassador Plaza neighborhood center in Lafayette, Louisiana, to Westwood AC Properties for $5.3 million. According to Transwestern VP Fred Victor, who brokered the deal for Kimco, the property benefits greatly from being shadow-anchored by an Albertson’s grocery store. Ambassador Plaza boasts a wide variety of dining options, including Subway, Little Caesars, and Fruiti Smoothie.

Grocer serves up 13th consecutive quarter of same-store sales gains

Weis Markets saw its sales and income increase in its second quarter. The company’s net income in the quarter totaled $18.5 million, a 21% increase over the year-ago period. Operating income rose 15.2% to $27.7 million, compared with $24.1 million in the same period last year. Sales rose 20% to $876.6 million. Same-store sales rose 2.7%, after adjustment for the Easter holiday shift.
Siemens Case Study
The most profitable retailers in sales per square foot are....

Sales per square foot are declining across the board. But some retailers continue to pull in hefty revenue. The No. 1 retailer in terms of sales per square foot is Apple Inc., which does a staggering $5,546 per square foot, according to research provided by CoStar.
Regulatory Wrap-Up: Where state and national policy impact retail

Wages
New Market closes on 34th center

Formed just three years ago, an aggressive acquirers of grocery-anchored centers has purchased its 34th property. New Market Properties, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Preferred Apartment Communities, has acquired Irmo Station, a Kroger-anchored center in Columbia, South Carolina. The company targets high-yield suburban markets in Texas and the mid-Atlantic and Southeast regions and market-leading grocery anchors such as Publix, Kroger, and HEB.
Tennessee center to get new owner and new image

The willow is associated with weeping, and the appearance of WillowTree Plaza in Cookeville, Tennessee, is certainly sad by modern standards. But now the center near Tennessee Tech University has a new owner and, soon, will get a new look. Boca Raton-based Fimiani Partners has purchased the 110,000-sq.-ft. center for $4.2 million and plans to invest in a new roof, a repaved parking lot, and a new paint job for Willow Tree.
Amazon still exploring ‘cashier-less’ checkout projects

Don’t expect Amazon to stop experimenting with cashier-less grocery stores anytime soon. Despite announcing in June it would acquire Whole Foods Market for $13.7 billion, the online giant will continue evolving its Amazon Fresh and Amazon Go concepts, among other efforts. Its goal: to reinvent the way consumers shop for food, according to Business Insider.
Online giant’s new delivery system targets apartment dwellers

Amazon’s new delivery system makes a play for a customer segment initially targeted by Walmart’s e-commerce arm. The online giant introduced a new delivery locker designed for apartment blocks and other housing complexes that may not have services to accept or store packages. Called The Hub by Amazon, the modular system features compartments where packages can be stored for pickup.
GNC’s profits fall in Q2

Despite online and in-store transaction growth, GNC’s income and revenue declined in the second quarter.
Lidl Makes Its Move on America

Churchill and the RAF weren’t available to head off this German invasion. The proliferation of German discount grocers Aldi and Lidl in the U.K. over the past decade carved out a new battlefield for Tesco, Sainsbury’s, Asda, and Morrisons, and they are still mired in the mud. Second-quarter results released by market researcher Kantar showed the Germans growing 19% over last year, while the British Big Four edged up less than 2%.