Convenience Stores

Based on its recent bold expansion into the grocery segment, Amazon is primed to give food and beverage e-commerce a shot of adrenaline.   This was according to “U.S. Grocery Market Focus: The Amazon Food Shopper,” a report from Packaged Goods.    According to the firm’s estimates, Amazon's 2016 online food and beverages sales, including AmazonFresh, is at $1.5 billion. This volume is expected to rise to $2.3 billion in 2017, giving the company a 19% share of the online market.

Don't believe the hype — physical retail is still growing, particularly in three key segments.   Retailers are opening 4,080 more stores in 2017 than they are closing, according to a new research report from IHL Group, and they plan to open over 5,500 more in 2018. Mass-merchandisers, including off-pricers and value chains, are the fastest-growing retail segment (+1,905 stores), followed by convenience stores (+1,700 stores) and grocery retailers (+674 stores).  

Domino's Pizza may be adding a new item to its take-out menu — driverless deliveries.   The pizza giant is teaming up with Ford Motor Co. to test how well self-driving vehicles can make pizza deliveries. The partners will evaluate how customers react to interacting with a self-driving vehicle within their delivery experience — data that is paramount to understanding how customers perceive the future of food delivery with self-driving vehicles.  

Target Corp. is giving Trader Joe's some competition — albeit at a slightly higher price — when it comes to bargain-priced wine.    On September 3, Target will launch its own line of wines at more than 1,100 stores nationwide. The line, called California Roots, consists of five different blends, with two whites and three reds. And each will sell for $5 a bottle.  

Amazon found a savvy way to remind customers that it now owns Whole Foods Market.  

Riverstone Capital Group has purchased the 43,199-sq.-ft. Shops at Lexington Circle in the Atlanta suburb of Peachtree City.   Anchored by a Sprouts Farmers Market and located on the West Highway 54 retail corridor, the property offered for sale by Mirabeland Investments and Concordia Properties was not on the market long, according to the deal’s broker.  

JAB Holding Company, the Luxembourg-based private equity firm, continues to expand its U.S. portfolio at a rapid pace. The company has entered into an agreement to buy Bruegger’s Bagels from Le Duff America, the Dallas-based parent of la Madeleine French Bakery & Cafe. Terms of the transaction were not disclosed.  

Restaurants, off-price retailers, dollar stores and furniture outlets are likely to remain firmly in the brick-and-mortar corner even with the continued rise of online shopping.   That is according to a new report by JLL, which explores the relationship between how shoppers value goods and the way 13 retail categories will be sold.