Logistics

Sears Holdings is considering spinning off its Lands’ End and Sears Auto Center brands as part of a wide-ranging strategic review of its business. The company’s Sears Canada subsidiary has also sold five Canadian store leases to Cadillac Fairview Corporation Limited for about $383.4 million.

Amazon.com is finalizing plans to open a new 1.2 million-sq.-ft. fulfillment center in Moreno Valley, Calif., which will create more than 1,000 full-time jobs ahead of the holiday shopping season.

This will be Amazon’s fourth fulfillment center in the state. The company’s other sites are located in Patterson, San Bernardino and Tracy.

Pittsburgh – Dick’s Sporting Goods opens five new stores across the U.S. on Nov. 8. The stores will be located in Dover, Del., Palm Desert, Calif., West Des Moines, Iowa, Sioux Falls, S.D., and Findlay, Ohio.

Dick’s will operate a total of 554 stores in the U.S. upon opening the five new stores. The Sioux Falls store will be the chain’s first store in South Dakota. This total will include three in Delaware, 32 in California, five in Iowa, and 38 in Ohio.

Target Canada is on schedule to open 33 additional Canadian store locations spanning across nine provinces, including its first stores in New Brunswick, Prince Edward Island and Newfoundland.

The retailer plans to open 31 stores Nov. 13, and the remaining two Nov. 22. Target will announce additional store openings beyond 2013 at a later date.  

New York -- Fountain Capital and Cheney & Mathes Properties have announced through their partnership, Fountain Mathes I, that they have acquired a 450,000-sq.-ft. portfolio of retail shopping centers with 16 properties in 10 states. Each center is shadow-anchored by Wal-Mart projects.

The centers largely contain national credit tenants such as AT&T, Cato, Dollar Tree, GameStop, Hibbett Sports, Payless and Shoe Show. The portfolio is 95% occupied.

Macy’s is poised to have its best digital Christmas ever thanks to a major expansion of ship from store fulfillment capabilities that enable the company to provide an omnichannel experience.

This holiday season, Macy’s will be able to fulfill orders placed online from 500 of its more than 800 stores, a major expansion from last year when ship from store was available at 250 locations.

“The way we view omnichannel is about having stores serve as another fulfillment location,” said Pam Sweeney, Macy’s SVP of logistics systems.

Grand Rapids, Mich. -- Meijer announced that it is now operating one of the largest all-clean diesel fleets in North America. As part of its ongoing green initiatives, the Grand Rapids, Mich.-based retailer's fleet utilized innovative technology to improve fuel efficiency and reduce its carbon footprint by nearly 60% since it first began implementing the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's 2010 near-zero emissions standards three years ago.

A compressed shopping season coupled with the continued growth of e-commerce has UPS forecasting that peak season daily package volumes will grow by 8%.