Sales & Marketing

New York -- A survey released Wednesday by Harris Interactive found that spending can be impacted by concern for the environment. While that has remained constant among many age groups, more young adults ages 18-to-24 say they are taking the environment into consideration when making purchases.

Hoffman Estates, Ill. -- Sears Holdings Corp. said Wednesday it has launched a new online charity project designed to parlay customer opinions into charitable contributions.

The project, called “Love/Hate: Share Your Thoughts, Send Some Love,” allows customers to review a product in order to vote for one of four charities. The participating charities competing for the grand prize of $100,000 include the American Cancer Society, St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital, World Vision and World Wildlife Fund.

New York -- Modell’s Sporting Goods, which operates 150+ brick-and-mortar stores as well as Modells.com, said Wednesday it has selected San Luis Obispo, Calif.-based e-commerce provider Shopatron as its order management solution to deliver officially licensed sports gear to fans just in time for the playoffs.

Modell's said it will continue to add more product categories to the site throughout the year, including athletic footwear, active apparel and other sporting goods, to bring its complete in-store selection online.

Target this week featured collection of Procter & Gamble’s leading brands under the auspices of a “summer stock-up” sale that offered purchasers of three items a $10 gift card.

New York -- Neiman Marcus is equipping all of its 4,000 associates at its full-line stores with smartphones in an effort to better serve customers, company executives said on the retailer’s recent conference call with analysts.

Neiman’s executives also said the company plans to remodel it stores on Michigan Avenue in Chicago, and in Bal Harbour Shops, Bal Harbour, Fla.
 

Toys“R”Us chairman and CEO Jerry Storch and Nordstrom Direct president Jamie Nordstrom are among the featured speakers at the Shop.org annual summit.

The annual event organized by Shop.org, a division of the National Retail Federation, will be held September 10 to 12 and the Colorado Convention Center and is billed as the premier gathering for retail e-commerce, digital and multichannel retailers.

Chicago -- RKF announced that Steve Schwartz and Lara Keene have joined the firm’s Chicago office as directors.

Schwartz and Keene, formerly of Baum Realty Group, mark the latest additions to the RKF Chicago office, which opened this past April as part of the firm’s ongoing expansion into key urban markets nationwide.
 
 

Greensboro, N.C. -- Fresh Market reported Wednesday that profit for the first quarter climbed 43% to $19.3 million, from $13.5 million in the year-ago period.

Revenue rose 23% to $324.8 million, compared with $264.5 million in the previous year and surpassing Wall Street’s expected $310.6 million in revenue.  Same-store sales increased 8.2%. The strong performance across the board prompted the grocer to bump its outlook for the year.