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Business Analytics

  • Strategic partnership positioned to drive AI in retail

    A new partnership will help retailers make smarter business decisions faster.   Based on a new alliance between IBM Watson and Salesforce, the companies will seamlessly connect their solutions — a move that will enable a new level of intelligent customer engagement across sales, service, marketing, and commerce, among other operations.     

  • Ulta Beauty to continue aggressive store expansion

    Ulta Beauty on Thursday reported a stellar fourth quarter that shows why many consider it one of the hottest retailers in the United States.      The beauty products retailer also said it would open approximately 100 net new stores in 2017, and remodel 13 locations.           Ulta Beauty’s net income for the quarter, ended Jan. 30, surged 30% to a better-than-expected $140.2 million, from $107.8 million in the year-ago period.  

  • Office supplies giant’s Q4 revenue, profit falls short

    Staples swung to a loss in its fourth quarter, and said it would close more stores in 2017.   The retailer reported a net loss of $615 million for the quarter ended Jan. 28, or $0.94 per share, compared to a profit of $86 million, or 20 cents per share, for the year-ago period. Adjusted non-GAAP earnings came in at $0.25 per share, one cent below the consensus estimate.  

  • Urban Outfitters posts double-digital sales growth in online channel

    Urban Outfitters Inc. ended its fiscal year more or less on target.    The retailer on Tuesday reported net income of $64.3 million, or 55 cents a share, just one cent shy of analysts’ estimates, and down from $72.9 million, or 61 cents a share, in the year ago period.   Total net sales rose 2% to $1.03 billion, matching Street forecasts.  

  • Making the Case for Strategic Liquidation Planning

    Every company has liquidation inventory: returned, excess, obsolete or damaged merchandise that can’t go back on store shelves. Though most organizations would rather not admit they have a need for it, liquidation is the rule – not the exception – in retail.  

  • Big Lots holds steady; store of the future coming

    Big Lots on Friday posted an unexpected decline in total revenue in its fourth quarter as a reduced store count cut into its sales. But the chain’s earnings topped the Street.      The close-out retailer also boosted its dividend and initiated a new share buyback program.  

  • Food Lion and Hannaford help lead Ahold Delhaize to strong Q4

    Ahold Delhaize’s Food Lion and Hannaford U.S. supermarkets had both strong fiscal fourth quarters and for fiscal 2016, the company stated in an earnings report. Volume growth was particularly strong, more than offsetting the impact of inflation on sales.   Underlying operating margins improved, driven by the “Easy, Fresh & Affordable” strategic initiative and synergies, said Ahold Delhaize.  

  • New joint venture promises better data analysis for retail real estate managers

    The asset disposition company A&G Realty has entered into a joint venture with a supermarket real estate veteran with the business proposition that better data analysis will help retailers be more proactive in managing real estate portfolios.  

  • How Amazon Web Services outage impacted retailers

    A good number of retailers were impacted when Amazon Web Services — the company’s most profitable division — experienced a four-hour outage on Tuesday.      The outage caused major headaches for millions of AWS customers, according to web monitoring and optimization firm Apica, which monitored the top 100 Internet retailer sites during the outage.       

  • Supermarket retailer turns in solid quarter

    Publix Supermarkets’ sales and profit rose in the fourth quarter amid continued expansion.      Publix’s net earnings for the fourth quarter rose 4.5% to $544.5 million, from $521.1 million in the year-ago period.   Sales rose 11.1% to $9.1 billion. (The additional week in the fourth quarter of 2016 increased sales by 7.4%.) Same-store sales increased 2.2%.  
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