Consumer Analytics

Chain Store Age is conducting a brief survey designed to take retailers' "new" media temperature. Together with shopping center owner Forest City Enterprises and research firm Alexander Babbage, Chain Store Age is surveying our retail readership to find out what retailers nationwide are doing in terms of social, mobile and other digital media initiatives.

PORT WASHINGTON, N.Y. — The NPD Group Inc. has named Kevin Gilbert as director of home improvement, reporting to Perry James, the president of home and office supplies. 

Prior to joining NPD, Gilbert was VP client solutions at SymphonyIRI, where he managed the Diageo and Kraft accounts. In addition to his role at SymphonyIRI, Gilbert spent many years in the packaged goods industry in category management, sales development, and trade planning roles, working with such companies as Kellogg, Bayer, and Pinnacle Foods.

CHICAGO — Just days after announcing a cooperation agreement with Nielsen, Walmart has entered a new relationship with SymphonyIRI Group, through which the two will develop a solution that supports the retailer's customer-centric initiatives.

It’s a good thing Target is preparing a major relaunch of its digital platform considering traffic to the company’s website has decelerated this year, according to online measurement firm comScore, which publishes a monthly list of the top 50 U.S. Web properties. Target climbed back into comScore’s to 50 ranking in June with 23.8 million unique visitors.

Target and Macy’s get the nod from Citigroup retail analyst Deb Weinswig as top picks to fare well this back-to-school season. In contrast to last week’s NRF survey, which forecasts a slight decline in spending, Weinswig is of the opinion that this year broadline and drug retailers will have their strongest seasonal performance since 2006 thanks to new fashion trends, a favorable weather outlook, inflation and high-end consumer demand.

If consumers can be trusted to accurately describe their spending intentions well in advance of when they actually incur expenses then this year’s back-to-school season will be weaker than last year’s. The National Retail Federation’s annual BTS survey got a lot of attention when it was released last week because consumer data compiled by the trade group forecast a decline in spending.

London -- Britain’s largest retailer Tesco said Sunday it plans to pilot free WiFi Internet service in its stores, allowing customers to compare prices and read product reviews as they shop.

According to a Sunday report by the Financial Times, the supermarket retailer is currently testing the service in four stores, with plans to quickly roll it out after evaluating the pilot.

Tesco is thought to be the first big U.K. retailer to test free WiFi.
 

NEW YORK— Target, Kohl's and JCPenney ranked highest among discounters in consumer perception in the first half of 2011, according to YouGov BrandIndex. The company interviews 5,000 people each weekday from a representative U.S. population sample, more than 1.2 million interviews per year.

Here is YouGov’s Retail Buzz scores for discounters in the first half of 2011:

1.  Target (33.9) 

2. Kohl's (29.5) 

3. J.C. Penney (23.9) 

New York City -- Best Buy has launched the first campaign under the new partnership between mobile shopping application ShopSavvy and vertical ad network Longboard Media.  

The campaign features targeted and location-based feature offers, local store inventory and branding content delivered when ShopSavvy users scan relevant products with their smartphones at Best Buy locations.

SCHAUMBURG, Ill. — Walmart has returned to the consumer packaged goods industry's information sharing model through a new cooperation agreement with Nielsen.