eCommerce

GOODLETTSVILLE, Tenn. -- Dollar General on Saturday hit another milestone, opening its 12,000th store in the small town of Juliette, Georgia.
 

Irvine, Calif.  -- Boot Barn Holdings announced it has entered into a definitive agreement to acquire Sheplers, a 116-year old western lifestyle company with 25 stores across the United States. The purchase price was put at $147 million in cash.

By rebranding the Sheplers stores to the Boot Barn banner, consistent with the strategies of its prior two acquisitions, Boot Barn will enhance its store footprint by adding eight new retail markets and build its position in Texas and Colorado.

Cincinnati -- George Zimmer, the founder and former head of Men’s Wearhouse, is back with a new business, called ZTailors, that will enable customers to order on-demand tailors to provide alterations. Using the service’s website or app, customers can schedule a tailor to come to their home or office to take the necessary measurements, with the altered items returned in several days.  

“It’s Uber for tailors,” Zimmer told the New York Times.

Seattle – Amazon.com reportedly plans to launch a line of private label grocery products. According to the Wall Street Journal, Amazon will add items such as milk, cereal, baby food and household cleaners to its Elements private label brand.

Currently, Amazon Prime members can purchase Elements baby wipes, and the retailer previously sold Elements diapers, as well. Amazon has recently applied for trademark protection for about two dozen Elements-branded products including coffee, soup, pasta, water, vitamins, dog food and razors.

San Francisco - Westfield San Francisco Centre has enlisted RetailNext Inc., a provider of retail analytics for brick-and-mortar stores, to provide in-store retail analytics technologies and services for Bespoke, its new retail-technology hub. Bespoke is made up of tech demonstration, coworking and event spaces.

Hot home furnishings retailer Wayfair has outgrown its chief technology officer, who also happens to be one of the company's co-founders.

So the retailer has hired Jeremy Delinsky to be the company’s new chief technology officer.

Delinsky joins Wayfair with more than a decade of leadership experience, formerly serving as CTO and, most recently, chief product officer (CPO) at athenahealth. Delinsky will report directly to Steve Conine, Wayfair’s co-founder and co-chairman. 

Toys“R”Us is launching an innovative social media campaign to raise money for one of the retailer’s most popular causes.

The retailer is hosting its fifth consecutive fundraising campaign to benefit Alex’s Lemonade Stand Foundation (ALSF), a nonprofit organization dedicated to finding a cure for childhood cancer.

By Jeff Trachsel

Showrooming has plagued brick-and-mortar retailers for years, with e-commerce quickly chipping away at in-store sales. Recently however, experts report the rising trend is actually the reverse - shoppers are now exploring options online before buying in-store. According to a 2014 report from BI Intelligence, reverse showrooming, or webrooming, is actually more common among U.S. consumers, with 69% of consumers researching online before transacting in-store.