Data & Analytics

Pittsburgh – Dick’s Sporting Goods Inc. beat Wall Street expectations for profit but failed to meet the Street with sales growth in the second quarter of fiscal 2015. The retailer also announced it plans to open 44 new Dick’s Sporting Goods stores and nine new Field & Stream stores, as well as relocate five Dick’s Sporting Goods stores and one Golf Galaxy store, during fiscal 2015.

Bentonville, Ark. -- In a shift to quality over quantity, Walmart has cut expansion plans for its Neighborhood Market stores despite the format’s consistently strong top line growth in recent years.

The CEO of Amazon.com is hitting back against an article in the New York Times over the weekend that accuses the retailer of having a ruthless and even abusive workplace culture.

According to CNBC, an internal memo (excerpt below) from CEO Jeff Bezos being circulated at Amazon.com calls the article inaccurate and beyond “isolated anecdotes.” Bezos also made the rounds on newspaper websites and on cable TV lambasting the Times article as "not the Amazon" he knows.

Minneapolis – The ongoing shakeup of senior management that has been occurring at Target Corp. since CEO Brian J. Cornell took the reins in August 2014 is continuing. Target has promoted John Mulligan, who has served as CFO since 2012, to the newly created role of executive VP and COO, effective Sept. 1.

New York – As millennial moms are making back-to-school preparations that include planning school lunches, many are turning to their peers and the Internet to get ideas. According to a survey of millennial moms about their back-to-school lunch plans by online review site Influenster, word of mouth (79%) is the top influencer for school lunch shopping decisions.

That is followed by online reviews (59%), social media (57%), brand websites (43%), television (37%), news websites (16%) and newspapers (15%).

Oakland, Calif. – Stores are apparently failing to deliver the goods when it comes to providing customers the products they want, when they want them. New research from supply chain technology provider GT Nexus shows that 75% of U.S. adults have found a product unavailable in a store in the past 12 months.

And 38% of U.S. adults experienced in-store stock-outs often or very often in the past 12 months.

Englewood, Colo. – Home shopping retailer QVC is expanding its omnichannel reach. QVC parent company Liberty Interactive Corp. is purchasing struggling online retailer Zulily Inc. for $2.4 billion in cash and stock.

QVC just gained some credibility among hipsters and millennials by buying a popular Internet flash sale site that caters to those younger shoppers.