Retail

The nationwide expansion of the Facebook Place Tips in-store mobile promotion service, complete with free proprietary Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE) beacons, was interesting news.  Here are three implications of Facebook’s latest effort to serve as a commercial platform:

As more brands evolve to a direct-to-consumer model, Unilever is expanding its direct selling to China by launching a flagship store on JD.com.

The Unilever flagship store on JD Worldwide, which is JD.com's cross-border e-commerce platform, will feature products from a range of Unilever’s most popular global brands such as Ponds, Dove and Vaseline. Notably, the flagship store will make available three product lines from Lux's shampoo range, which are currently the best-selling shampoo products in the Japanese market.

Hoffman Estates, Ill. – Kmart is shaking up its marketing operation with moves including the recent appointment of former DSW Chief Marketing Officer Kelly N. Cook as its chief marketing officer. There was never a formal announcement, but Cook’s LinkedIn profile indicates that she joined Kmart in that position in April.

As retailers race to make their gift registry services more interactive, Belk is launching a new wedding registry app.

In addition to in-store kiosks, registrants can now set up a registry, manage their registry and scan items using their smartphones.

The app features tips on what to register for and a registry checklist to make sure no items are missed. Any time a registrant is in the store and sees a new item they would like to add, they can scan from their smart phone to immediately add the item to their registry.

While technology and innovation flourish on the consumer side of fashion, inside retail headquarters, merchants and planners still rely on reports and tools that have barely evolved from the three-ring binders and green screens of the 1970s. Merchants and planners, many of whom grew up as digital natives, navigate an awkward time warp: They commute from the consumer world to offices that stifle their skills in interpreting and acting on visual, interactive data and tools.

Hangzhou, China — Alibaba Group Holding Ltd. will reportedly launch a paid streaming video service in China in August 2015. According to Reuters, the service will be called Tmall Box Office (TBO) and offer both originally developed content and content from third-party providers.

Toronto, Canada — Hudson’s Bay Company (HBC) is positioning itself for major global expansion with the purchase of the 15-year-old Galeria Kaufhof department store chain from German retail conglomerate Metro Group for about $3.17 billion. The planned purchase includes 103 Galeria Kaufof stores in Germany, as well as 16 German Sportarena stores and 16 Galeria Inno department stores in Belgium.

Target chairman and CEO Brian Cornell commented on the chain’s new partnership with CVS Health in a Q&A on Target’s blog, A Bullseye View. Here are some excerpts: