Retail

Fort Worth, Texas – Video game retailer GameStop Corp. has reportedly bid on the leases of 163 stores that bankrupt consumer electronic chain RadioShack Corp. is abandoning as of March 1. According to Reuters, GameStop’s total bid equaled about $2.44 million, or $15,000 per lease.

Aliso Viejo, Calif. - Johnny Rockets has named Charles Bruce as the company's new president and CEO. Bruce brings to Johnny Rockets more than 35 years of experience in marketing and leadership positions, most recently as president and CEO of Peter Piper Pizza,

Earlier in his career, Bruce held marketing and brand strategy positions with the International Pizza Hut Franchise Holders Association as VP of marketing, and at Wendy's as VP of international marketing.
 

The biggest news at the International Home and Housewares Show didn’t involve a new product introduction, but rather an information sharing arrangement between The NPD Group and Nielsen that will help retailers and supplier make sense of the market.

Seattle -- Nordstrom will open a full-line store in the new regional shopping center being developed by General Growth Properties in Norwalk, Connecticut.  

The three-level, 150,000-sq.-ft. store is scheduled to open in fall 2018 and will be the company's second full-line store in the state. The company opened its first Nordstrom in Connecticut in 1997 near Hartford at Westfarms Mall in Farmington.

Houston -- Simon is further elevating its signature Houston Galleria by investing in a $30 million renovation of the luxury wing in addition to adding a new Saks Fifth Avenue flagship, 110,000 sq. ft. of new retail space, and a 14,000-sq.-ft. freestanding retail building.

Salisbury, N.C. – Food Lion will remodel its Raleigh, North Carolina market stores in 2015. The Raleigh market remodels are expected to be completed in stores on a rolling basis between April and October 2015.

Food Lion will continue to launch enhancements for customers across all of its 1,100 stores in 2015, as well as remodels in markets over time. Raleigh is the third market to receive the store remodels. Seventy-six stores in the greater Wilmington and Greenville, North Carolina markets were remodeled in 2014.

Ross Stores is less than two months into its new fiscal year and already the company is halfway home on its 2015 new store growth plan and asserting its long term potential.

Ross confirmed that since the beginning of its fiscal year on Feb. 1, it opened 32 Ross Dress for Less stores and five dd’s Discounts stores in 15 states.

The company’s full year plan disclosed when fourth quarter results were released on Feb. 26, calls for 70 Ross stores and 20 dd’s Discounts stores.

Brampton, Canada -- Loblaw Companies Ltd., Canada’s largest supermarket chain, will open 50 new stores and renovate 100 existing stores in 2015 as part of a $1.2 billion investment in its business.  

The investment also  e-commerce expansion, and supply chain and IT infrastructure.