Convenience Stores

Confident consumers stocked up on gifts and other merchandise over the 2014 holiday season, helping boost overall holiday retail sales to their highest level since 2011.

According to the National Retail Federation, December retail sales, which exclude automobiles, gas stations and restaurants, decreased 0.9% seasonally adjusted month-to-month, and 4.6% unadjusted year-over-year. The significant drop in gasoline prices in the month of December brought down much of the month-to-month growth.

While there were some reported ups and downs over the course of last year’s holiday shopping season, the early takeaway is that the season was, in the end, positive. While we’ll have to wait for hard numbers for more detailed insight, and while definitive conclusions might be a bit much to draw at this point, it does seem to me like the increased length of the ever-expanding holiday shopping season didn’t have any appreciable negative impact.

New York -- The fast-growing online grocery delivery startup Instacart confirmed it has raised $220 million in a funding round led by the venture capital firm Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers. This latest round of funding values the San Francisco-based company, founded in 2012, at a whopping $2 billion, according to various reports.

Memphis -- Discount general merchandise chain Fred’s has named Michael K. Bloom as its president and COO, effective immediately. Until recently, Bloom held the same position at Family Dollar Stores Inc.; he resigned in early January after just over two years in the position and could be owed as much as $4.8 million in severance by Family Dollar, according to an SEC filing.

Memphis -- Discount general merchandise chain Fred’s has named Michael K. Bloom as its president and COO, effective immediately. Until recently, Bloom held the same position at Family Dollar Stores Inc.; he resigned in early January after just over two years in the position and could be owed as much as $4.8 million in severance by Family Dollar, according to an SEC filing.

Dallas -- Corner Bakery Café has named Salil Bapat as CFO, effective immediately. Bapat previously was CFO for YUM Brands' Latin America and Caribbean region.

WILLIAMSVILLE, N.Y. — Tops Friendly Markets, a grocer in upstate New York, northern Pennsylvania and western Vermont, is closing pharmacy departments in 27 of its 162 locations this month and transferring pharmacy prescriptions and inventory to five CVS/Pharmacy and 22 Rite Aid locations near each affected store.

Fred's Super Dollar has turned to a former Family Dollar and CVS executive to become its next president and chief operating officer.

Michael Bloom brings to Fred's more than 30 years of experience in small-box general merchandising, supply chain management and store operations, the company said. Most recently, he served as the president and COO of Family Dollar Stores. 

Matthews, N.C. -- Family Dollar is urging its shareholders to support a buyout offer from rival discounter Dollar Tree with less than two weeks remaining before a vote on the pending deal.  Family Dollar shareholders are scheduled to vote Jan. 22. on whether to accept the Dollar Tree offer.

Canton, Mass. -- Dunkin' Brands Group, the parent company of Dunkin' Donuts and Baskin-Robbins, announced that in 2014 its U.S. franchisees opened a total of 422 net new Dunkin' Donuts and Baskin-Robbins.