Convenience Stores

At the recent MIT CIO Symposium, Bryan Kirschner, director of the research/strategy organization Apigee Institute, and Jerry Wolfe, CEO and founder of food industry platform services provider Vivanda, participated in a panel discussion on consumer connectivity and engagement. Chain Store Age followed up with the two experts to ask a few more questions about engaging today’s connected customer.

How can retailers use APIs (application program interfaces) to provide a more personalized customer experience?

Carpinteria, Calif. -- With more Americans using credit, debit and prepaid goods to pay for goods and services, the amount merchants pay to process those cards continues to rise.

While 2014 was rocky for a great many retailers, with several thousand store closings across most categories of retail, the first half of 2015 has seen some encouraging signs of a modest resurgence in certain retail sectors and from select brands. The higher numbers of store closings are far from over, and it would not be accurate to refer to 2015 as a total turnaround, but it does seem noteworthy that there are significant categories of retail that have aggressively moved to capitalize on opportunities.

National food, beverage and household brands continue to lose their place in Americans’ shopping carts, according to a new survey.

Deloitte’s annual American Pantry Study of more than 354 brands across 34 product categories found that nearly three in four (73%) of consumer packaged goods categories show an overall decline in their status as “must have” brands.

Walmart Neighborhood Markets offer a compelling source of new sales growth for the company, Moody’s says in a new report. 

Despite strategic shifts to compete more successfully with the company, traditional supermarkets will feel the pressure as Walmart moves to increase its already dominant share of the U.S. grocery segment.

Shoppers in need of same-day delivery of Thai oyster sauce or Indonesian soy sauce may not have to leave their homes to buy the ingredients if Instacart has any say about it.

The online grocery delivery service based in San Francisco announced Wednesday that it would begin delivering to Boston and Cambridge residents from H Mart, one of the largest and fastest growing Asian grocery chains in the United States.

New York – Disney and Ralph Lauren, vertical brands with a strong retail presence, are the highest-ranked retailers in a new Brand Keys survey of what brands U.S. consumers consider the most patriotic. To determine the rankings, Brand Keys drilled down into consumer response to 230 brands to see which were most associated with the value of patriotism.

Following is a list of the retailers who made the list of top 50 most patriotic brands, with their emotional engagement strength for patriotism:

No. 3: Disney (96%)

Grand Rapids, Mich. - Meijer has moved into its sixth state, opening its first two Wisconsin supercenters. The 192,000-sq.-ft. stores in Grafton and Kenosha have created nearly 600 jobs.

In addition to the retailer's grocery, merchandise and garden center at each store, the new pharmacies offer drive-thru pick up and the Meijer free prescription program.

In August, Meijer will open two additional stores in Wauwatosa and Oak Creek. The retailer has plans for continued growth in Wisconsin.
 

Waban, Mass. – Grocery retailer H-E-B produces a positive emotional reaction with consumers. Based on a study of 10,000 U.S consumers, H-E-B, Publix, Chick-fil-A, and Trader Joe's took the top four spots in the 2015 Temkin Emotion Ratings, which rates how customers feel about their interactions with 293 companies across 20 industries.

A study of 10,000 U.S. consumers revealed H-E-B, Publix and Trader Joe's are tops when it comes to making customers feel delighted.