Convenience Stores

A stronger than average flu season helped Rite Aid post an increase in same store sales for January.   The company reported a 4.8% increase in same-store sales for the four weeks ended Jan. 24. Rite Aid's January front-end same-store sales increased 2.9%.  

Camp Hill, Pa. – Same-store sales rose 4.8% in January 2015 compared to the same month a year earlier at Rite Aid Corp. Front-end same store sales increased 2.9% while same store pharmacy sales, which included negative impact from new generic introductions, increased 5.7%.

Total drugstore sales increased 4.3% to $2.03 billion compared to $1.943billion for the same period the prior year. Prescription sales accounted for 70.3% of drugstore sales.
 

WASHINGTON, D.C.  — The Joint Industry Coupon Committee on Thursday urged retailers to prepare for the retirement of UPC Prefix 5 barcodes from manufacturer coupons. These symbols will no longer be used after June 30, 2015, as manufacturers shift to exclusive use of the GS1 DataBar format for coupons.   

Seven weeks into her new role as chief operating officer of Walmart’s U.S. stores division Judith McKenna shared insights into her priorities for the retailer’s domestic business with a gathering of more than 400 suppliers Friday morning.

Cary, N.C. – The Pantry Inc. is heading into its pending merger with Alimentation Couche-Tard Inc. in a profitable state. During the first quarter of fiscal 2015, The Pantry reported net income of $18.9 million, compared to a net loss of $5.1 million in the same quarter a year earlier.

New York -- T2, a specialty tea store in the Shoreditch area of London, and designed by Landini Associates, of Sydney, Australia, was named Store of the Year by the Retail Design Institute, whose annual design competition recognized more than 45 retail design projects in 20-plus retail formats for excellence in design and execution. The winning projects were honored at the Institute's 44th Annual Awards Gala, at the TimesCenter Stage, New York City.

New York - With gas prices down 31% since June 2014 and oil prices tumbling to their lowest levels in several years, American consumer confidence has improved dramatically. According to the Nielsen Consumer Confidence Report, in fourth quarter 2014 U.S. consumer confidence went up 12 percentage points year-over-year.

New York -- Small formats are all the rage in retail these days, so no wonder the latest data from Nielsen shows 2014 was another year of record growth.

The U.S. convenience store count increased to 152,794 stores as of Dec. 31, a nearly 1% increase from the year prior, according to the 2015 NACS/Nielsen Convenience Industry Store Count.