Sales & Marketing

Amazon.com has announced that this holiday season, thousands of third-party sellers will have the opportunity to participate in its holiday deals promotion program.

Third-party sellers on Amazon will be allowed to offer holiday deals that will be featured on the Amazon holiday deal pages, including its Today’s Deals page. Holiday deals from sellers will appear on high customer traffic merchandising pages which highlight limited-time discounts on holiday items exclusively from sellers.

I have now been in my role as senior editor of Chain Store Age, specializing in retail IT coverage, for six months. Beyond being surprised at how quickly the past 180 days have gone by and grateful at how welcoming the industry has been to me, I also can’t help but be amazed at how much retail IT has changed since I was last actively involved in covering this field in 2006.

Salt Lake City – Supply chain technology vendor Park City Group has named Gary Rocheleau, a 40-year retail industry veteran who most recently served as VP of retail marketing execution for Safeway subsidiary Vons Pavilions, as senior advisor.

Other previous roles Rocheleau has held include president of Grocery Works, Safeway’s home shopping and delivery company. He began his career with Lucky Stores, Inc., where he spent nearly 23 years and his last position was VP of grocery.

New York – Tiffany & Co. is relaunching its Tiffany.com e-commerce site. The site includes enhanced zoom capabilities and several expanded sections.

Blue Book, the company’s collection of couture jewels, is showcased with scenes from the Tiffany Workshop where they are created, as well as an expanded engagement section with a gemologist’s video and review of Tiffany’s quality standards.

Big Lots has appointed former Kmart executive Andrew Stein as the company's SVP and chief customer officer, as the company focuses more intensely on bolstering its digital footprint.

Austin, Texas – Digital coupon provider RetailMeNot, Inc. has named Gokul Rajaram to its board of directors, effective Oct. 15. Rajaram is currently product engineering lead at Square, where he leads software development for Square Register, a full point-of-sale system for local businesses, and other products.

Gokul Rajaram, head of product engineering at disruptive payments company Square, has joined the board of directors at digital coupon marketplace RetailMeNot.

Westlake Village, Calif. – Guitar Center is opening a Serato-branded digital music area in its Brooklyn, N.Y., store on Oct. 24. The 2,500-sq.-ft. area provides a space for DJs and producers to demo and buy Serato products.