Business Analytics

Pricing can be a mysterious and dimly lit dimension for many retailers.

Sally Beauty Supply LLC is emerging from the pricing twilight and entering the zone of effectively targeted price strategy in a new partnership with Revionics. The specialty beauty chain will deploy Revionics Price Optimization solution, which includes price management, strategic price simulation and optimization.

Dollar General is rightsizing its expense structure by eliminating several hundred positions at its home office.

Dollar General said that effective immediately it had eliminated 255 positions but noted that 115 of those positions were vacant. The move follows an announcement the previous week by Walmart to eliminate 450 positions at its Bentonville, Ark., headquarters. Dollar General said the move was part of a broader initiative aimed at proactively improving efficiencies and reducing expenses by restructuring its corporate support functions.

Amazon.com now allows sellers to promote products with keyword targeted ads and cloud-based e-commerce solutions provider ChannelAdvisor is ready to help sellers take advantage of the sponsored products feature.

ChannelAdvisor Corp. announced its support Monday for Amazon’s Advertising API (application programming interface), becoming the first e-commerce solution provider to offer this support.

J.C. Penney CEO Marvin Ellison contends the retailer’s turnaround plan is working and by executing three key strategies it will achieve a financial milestone that was unthinkable a few years ago.

Brevity is the soul of online retail.

According to a new survey of more than 300 consumers from checkout optimization provider PCA Predict, 84% of U.S. consumers stated they would abandon their e-commerce order if presented with complicated or lengthy Web forms.

Asked about their experience with retailers failing to deliver, an overwhelming 95% of U.S. consumers said that they would be unlikely to shop with a retailer again if an order failed to arrive.

For the third consecutive year, Apple and Google came out on top in a ranking of the 100 most valuable brands in the world.

A new survey has revealed some more glum news about shrink in the U.S. retail industry.

The 2015 U.S. Retail Fraud Survey by Retail Knowledge and Volumatic has estimated that U.S. retailers are losing $60 billion a year to shrink -- up from $57 billion last year. And employee theft is the single biggest cause of loss to retailers.

The importance of expense control at Walmart became evident on Friday when the retailer confirmed it planned to eliminate 450 positions as part of a broader restructuring effort.

Citing favorable market conditions and a desire to “de-risk” its pension plan, nearly 14,000 participants in J.C. Penney’s retirement plan opted to receive lump sum payments.

E-commerce sales surged at Pier 1 Imports during the second quarter, but the retailers overall sales grew less than expected and the company lowered its full year outlook.

Total sales increased 2.7% to $430 million and same-store sales increased 2.5%. Excluding the effects of the stronger U.S. dollar, total sales increased 4% and same-store sales increased 3.8%.