Mass Merchant

Leveraging inventory while driving consumption is the topic of a presentation scheduled for next week in Northwest Arkansas by Walmart’s senior director of consumables replenishment Kendall Trainor.

Trainor is the featured speaker at a breakfast meeting organized by Doing Business in Bentonville. From 7-9 a.m. Wednesday, November 13, Trainor will share insights on Walmart’s top five inventory priorities for the coming fiscal year.

Bentonville, Ark. – A glitch on the U.S. website of Wal-Mart reportedly provided consumers with enormous discounts for a short time on the morning of Nov. 6. According to Reuters, treadmills that normally cost hundreds of dollars were selling for $33.16 and widescreen computer monitors were selling for $9.

Wal-Mart has not said how many discounted items were sold before the glitch was discovered. The retailer has also said it will not honor any sales resulting from the glitch, but will give those consumers a $10 gift card.

New York – The average consumer will spend $825 on holiday purchases in 2013, a 5% drop from last year. According to the new Brand Keys annual holiday survey, only 19% of shoppers surveyed indicated that they started shopping for the holidays in October, 5% fewer than 2012.

Walmart split with its Indian joint venture partner of seven years recently and the smart folks at the University of Pennsylvania Wharton School of Business put the situation in perspective and offered insight into future possibilities for a market that still boasts more than 1 billion potential consumers and promising long-term prospects.

Stein Mart posted strong sales in October, driven partly by upgraded designer and national brands. Total sales for the four-week period ended Nov. 2, increased 6.9% and comparable-store sales increased 5.4%.

For the third quarter ended Nov. 2, total sales increased 6.1% and comparable-store sales increased 4.8%.

Austin, Texas – Smartphones are starting to edge out other popular forms of consumer technology as holiday gifts. According to a new survey from RetailMeNot and The Omnibus Company, within the next five years, less than one-in-five winter holiday gift givers plan to buy someone a portable music player (19%), desktop computer (19%), GPS device (13%) or regular cell phone (9%) for the holidays.

Columbus, Ohio – Lane Bryant is opening four stores at different shopping centers on Nov. 8. These locations include a refreshed store at Eastwood Towne Center and a new store at The Marketplace at Delta Township in Lansing, Mich., as well as new stores at the Clackamas Promenade in Clackamas, Ore., and the Epps Bridge Center in Athens, Ga.

Lane Bryant operates more than 800 full-line and outlet stores in 48 states nationwide.

A pricing glitch on Walmart.com this week generated enormous publicity and did more to promote the retailer’s e-commerce business in advance of the holiday season than any of its other marketing efforts.