Sales & Marketing

New York -- U.S. consumers want a more personalized retail experience but are conflicted about disclosing the type of personal information that goes along with it, according to a survey from Accenture. Nearly 60% of consumers want real-time promotions and offers, yet only 20% want retailers to know their current location and only 14% want to share their browsing history.

New York – Specialty retailer Aerie, a subsidiary of American Eagle Outfitters, is capitalizing on the “selfie” craze in its newest promotion. The company has created what it calls the world's largest unretouched selfie and photo shoot as part of its #AerieREAL “Love Your Real Selfie” promotion.

Former Safeway executive Keith Colbourn has joined Coupons.com in a new retail oriented role focused on targeting and analytics.

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.

Loblaw is already Canada’s largest retailer and it plans to stay that way by spending more than $1 billion this year on new stores, e-commerce expansion and supply chain improvements.

As Canada's largest network of corporate and independently owned retail stores and formats, each employing between 20 and 300 employees, Loblaw's investment is expected to create more than 20,000 jobs through store staffing and construction.

By Gregg Aamoth, CEO, POPcodes

The onset of 2015 marked a huge change in shipping costs, and as a result retailers are struggling to find ways to maintain their bottom lines. As of Jan. 1, packages are now being evaluated by their “dimensional weight,” or volume, instead of determining price by weight alone. Experts say that the when combined with other annual rate hikes and surcharges, the resulting average rate increases will be as high as 30% or more.

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.

San Francisco -- Apple on Monday announced that the Apple Watch will be available starting April 24, to customers in the United States, the United Kingdom, Australia, Canada, China, France, Germany, Hong Kong, and Japan. For shoppers who can’t wait that long, the device will be available for preview, try-on and preorder starting April 10.