Convenience Stores

DALLAS — 7-Eleven stores have introduced a Pillsbury Cinnamon Roll, the retailer's first warm bakery offering and the first Pillsbury-branded fresh-bakery item with a convenience retailer.

Available with hot foods as well as in the fresh bakery case at participating stores, 7-Eleven's sweetly spiced will be available for purchase for $1.69 each.

Atlanta – Chick-fil-A is running a “Breakfast on Us” cross-channel promotion that offers a free breakfast entrée to customers who make an online reservation for any Chick-fil-A restaurant. Beginning Aug. 29, customers can visit Chick-fil-AForBreakfast.com to reserve a breakfast entree of choice, as well as a time to redeem their breakfast item at a local Chick-fil-A restaurant between Sept. 9 and Spt. 14.

Irving, Texas -- Michaels Stores Inc.’s second-quarter profit soared 53.8% amid higher sales and lower interest expenses.

The retailer reported a profit of $20 million for the quarter ended Aug. 3, compared with $13 million a year earlier.
Sales inched up 1.3% to $904 million. Same-store sales fell 1.3%, due to a 3.6% decrease in transactions and a 0.4% decrease in deferred custom framing revenue, which was partially offset by a 2.7% increase in the company's average ticket.

MEMPHIS, Tenn. — Fred's experienced growth in sales, customer traffic, average ticket and gross margin for the second quarter ended Aug. 3.

The company’s net income for the quarter was $3.3 million, or $0.09 per diluted share, compared with net income of $6.1 million, or $0.17 per diluted share, in the year-earlier period. However, the prior-year quarter included a benefit of approximately $4 million, or $0.11 per diluted share, for favorable tax credits. 

Old Bridge, N.J. — R.J. Brunelli & Co. has announced that it has been retained as exclusive real estate broker in several New Jersey counties for three fast casual chains: BurgerFi, Corner Bakery Café and Tommy’s Coal Fired Pizza. All three restaurants are seeking end-cap or freestanding pad locations with outdoor seating in lifestyle centers, power centers and other high-traffic locations, in areas offering high daytime and residential populations.

CHARLOTTE, N.C. — Snyder's-Lance has acquired all assets of Stateline Service Corporation, a snack food distributor in Massachusetts, as part of its growth initiative. 

Walmart will be making a progressing move and extending health insurance benefits to same-sex domestic partners of its U.S. employees starting next year, according to a Reuters report. 

The report stated that the retailer will also offer vision care to its eligible employees and their dependents.

L3 Capital invests in what it calls prime urban retail, which includes a lot of street retail in the premier cities. "We own retail properties in several neighborhoods in New York City, Los Angeles and Chicago," said Greg Schott managing piincipal.

At the end of last year, L3 made its first investment in its hometown of Chicago. The company bought four retail buildings along a flourishing four-block retail stretch of Southport Avenue in the Lakewood neighborhood. The cost was $13 million for 17,000 sq. ft.

MANY HAPPY RETURNS

It's no secret that the volume of returned items goes up dramatically during the holidays, and providing a streamlined returns mechanism that effectively guards against fraud is a big and often overlooked part of the in-store holiday experience. Here are two solutions that take a slightly different approach to helping retailers deliver a returns process that rewards good customers, while detecting those with less savory motives.

Millennials and boomers are driving an urban push

Generations after people deserted cities for the suburbs, young millennial-generation adults and older baby-boomer adults are moving back downtown.

Retailers aren't far behind, and new, seemingly instant neighborhoods — complete with housing, retail, offices and other forms of real estate — are springing up in redevelopment areas of cities across the country.