eCommerce

Philadelphia - Urban Outfitters Inc. plans to relocate its Trenton, South Carolina e-commerce fulfillment center to Gap, Pennsylvania. Construction of the new one million-sq.-ft. fulfillment center in Gap is on schedule to be complete by July 2015.

New York -- Jonathan Ive, senior VP of design at Apple, is working on a redesign of Apple stores to make them feel more like a “natural” environment for the forthcoming Apple Watch, according to an article in The New Yorker.

“Ive has begun to work with (Angela) Ahrendts, Apple’s senior VP of retail, on a redesign-as yet unannounced-of the Apple Stores,” author Ian Parker writes in the article.

By Frank Layo, Kurt Salmon

First the bad news: The chronic congestion tying the West Coast ports in knots is on track to cost U.S. retailers some $7 billion this year, and losses could total nearly $37 billion by the end of 2016.

And the good news? At the moment, there doesn’t seem to be much to speak of.

Apple is reportedly planning an overhaul of its once ground-breaking retail stores.

When Apple first opened retail stores 13 years ago, it set out to change retailing in everything from the product displays to the wireless point-of-sale devices and its Genius Bar tech support. The approach was innovative and widely successful.

Armonk, N.Y. - Consumers headed online for their Valentine’s Day shopping this year. According to IBM Digital Analytics Benchmark data, during Valentine’s week (Feb. 7 – 13) online shopping rose 10.2% from the same period in 2014.

In addition to overall sales, consumers ramped up their shopping efforts the week leading up to Valentine’s Day. Growth was seen in key verticals including:

Amsterdam, Netherlands – Data breaches are on the rise around the world. Digital security provider Gemalto released the latest edition of its Breach Level Index (BLI), revealing that more than 1,500 data breaches led to one billion data records compromised worldwide during 2014.

By Haydn Simpson, NetNames

A new set of stiff federal regulations reportedly may limit or even scuttle Amazon.com’s plans for a drone-based aerial delivery service.

The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) says operators of unmanned commercial aircraft, which would include Amazon drones, must keep the craft in their line of sight and not fly them over people. The FAA is currently consulting with individuals and interested parties about drone regulations, and has said it is willing to be flexible in how rules are written and implemented.