Sales & Marketing

LOS ANGELES — Virtual Piggy, an online service that allows parents to monitor their children's online shopping behavior, has appointed Laura Janke Jaeger as general counsel. 

Jaeger has more than 20 years of experience advising boards and management teams on strategic and financing activities, as well as transactional and other corporate and regulatory issues. 

PALO ALTO, Calif. — Terapeak has launched an e-commerce market analytics solution designed to provide visibility into the Amazon marketplace giving online retailers access to Amazon market data as well as their own sales data.

The solutions tool features product, offer and sales rank searches in more than 35 Amazon categories; average, minimum and maximum pricing data; competitor research and analysis; and the ability to view historical Amazon transactions. 

New York -- A report released Thursday by Bloomberg said that consumer sentiment climbed during the week ended June 16 to minus 29.4, compared with minus 31.3 a week earlier and representing a lift after a two-month low. In fact, according to the Bloomberg Consumer Comfort Index, Americans’ views on the economy were the least pessimistic in five years.

The monthly Bloomberg consumer economic expectations gauge for June held at minus 1, matching May’s reading as the best this year.

Growth opportunities in new geographies prompted Kroger to realign its organizational structure and place four executive in new roles.

Just two days after reporting strong first quarter results, the nation’s second largest food retailer established two new supermarket divisions in Nashville and Louisville.

Austin, Texas – Slightly more than half of consumers (51%) said they would be more likely to buy something in-store if they received a coupon on their mobile device for that store while nearby, according to a recent mobile commerce survey from RetailMeNot and The Omnibus Company. The survey of 1,067 U.S. residents age 18 and older conducted in April 2013 also revealed:

CHARLOTTE, N.C. — Southern department store Belk has selected 13 winners from nearly 300 entrants in the retailer's Southern Designer Showcase competition. Belk announced the winners at an event at its corporate headquarters.

"We are so excited to add these impressive designers to our Belk family," said president and CMO Kathryn Bufano. "This year's winners truly represent the Modern. Southern. Style. that we deliver to our customers every day."

By Shelley E. Kohan, [email protected]

Retail’s four walls are the most valuable marketing assets out there today. The brick-and-mortar stores that know how to optimize their physical locations for maximum productivity will be the ones who come out on top this year. Here are the top five trends that will distinguish the leaders from the laggards, and will define retail’s future for years to come:

1. The in-store experience

London – Omni-channel global fashion brand Burberry is taking a pioneering step into the realm of digital customer engagement with a new program called Burberry Kisses. Partnering with the Google Art, Copy & Code project that presents itself as a “series of experiments to re-imagine advertising,” Burberry is allowing consumers to send online letters which are sealed with digital replicas of their kisses, complete with their choice of Burberry lipstick shade.