Mass Merchant

New York — SL Green Realty Corp. and partner Jeff Sutton have announced the formation of a venture that has acquired a 49-year leasehold interest covering the entire retail portion of 650 Fifth Avenue. The transaction was completed with former U. S. Magistrate Judge Kathleen A. Roberts, the court-appointed federal monitor and interim trustee of the landlord, 650 Fifth Avenue Company.

If avoiding large crowds is your criteria for tackling the holiday shopping season, then ShopperTrak has some advice for you.

ShopperTrak, a leading provider of shopper analytics, has identified the 10 days between Thanksgiving and Christmas likely to have the least amount of in-store holiday shopper traffic, making them the best days to shop for consumers looking to do their shopping in a less frenzied environment.

Issaquah, Wash. — Construction is nearing completion on Issaquah Highlands’ new shopping and entertainment district, Grand Ridge Plaza. The Regency Centers Corp. center, which broke ground in the summer of 2012, is in the midst of its busiest rollout stretch, which features the grand opening of a Safeway grocery store.

Thorofare, N.J. -- Shrink, comprised of shoplifting, employee or supplier fraud, organized retail crime and administrative errors, cost the retail industry more than $112 billion globally last year, and represented 1.4% of retail sales, on average, according to the 2012-2013 Global Retail Theft Barometer. In the United States, shrink came in at 1.5% of retail sales.

Chicago -- ShopperTrak predicts that Wednesday, Dec. 4, will be the best day for consumers to shop this holiday season with the least amount of store shopper traffic.

New York -- Thirty-eight percent of shoppers are likely to shop on Thanksgiving Day this year, according to Accenture’s annual Holiday Shopping Survey. Of those shoppers planning to hit the stores on Thanksgiving, 41% said they will be out shopping between 6 p.m. Thanksgiving Day and 5 a.m. the next morning.

Less than a week after Office Depot and Officemax consummated their merger, the combined companies have a new chairman and CEO in former Delhaize America CEO Roland Smith.

In conjunction with the appointment of Smith, who also previously served as CEO of Wendy’s, the two CEOs of Office Depot and OfficeMax who were serving as co-CEOs of the combined company both resigned. Neil Austrian served as CEO of Office Depot and Ravi Saligram served as CEO of OfficeMax prior to the merger.

Bentonville, Ark. -- Walmart will start unveiling its Black Friday deals on Thanksgiving at 6 p.m., which is two hours earlier than last year, and stagger them throughout the night and all Black Friday weekend. The retailer is also offering a special incentive to employees who work on Thanksgiving Day: a 25% discount on an entire purchase this holiday season."