Data & Analytics

Deerfield, Ill. – Net earnings for Walgreen Co. soared in both the fourth quarter and full fiscal year 2013. Net earnings during the fourth quarter totaled $657 million, an 86.4% increase from $353 million in the same quarter a year ago, while net earnings for the full year rose 15.2% to $2.5 billion, from $2.1 billion.

Meijer plans to address the need many consumers have for more information about the health insurance exchanges that are part of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act.

George Taylor, a University of Pennsylvania Wharton School professor, came up with a theory called The Hemline Index in 1926. The theory identifies women’s hemlines as a leading economic indicator. Rising hemlines indicate that stock prices will begin to rise in the not-to-distant future. Falling hemlines indicate the falling stock prices and economic decline.

ECRM compared retail circular advertising in September 2012 versus September 2013 and noted trends occurring across top retail chains. Home Depot continued to cut circular pages, down 80% year-over-year to only four for September. Despite this, it has continued to dramatically increase the density of its circular, with a 180% increase in ad blocks per page. On the other hand, Lowe’s saw only minor year-over-year changes, with 25% increases in ad blocks per page and per circular.

Lewisville, Texas – Consumers prefer prepaid cards that can be used anywhere to gift cards from specific retailers and physical cards to digital cards.

According to the new “People Prefer Prepaid Rewards” study from Parago, more than half of shoppers prefer prepaid cards over gift cards from Amazon, iTunes, Target, Walmart, Home Depot and more. In addition, two out of three shoppers prefer physical cards over digital cards.

Walnut Creek, Calif. -- The Home Depot comes in first in a new ranking of retail digital gift card offerings. Retailers with the highest overall digital gifting scores in  a new RSR Research benchmarking report, “Digital Gift Cards: The Good, The Bad, And The Ugly, are The Home Depot, Sephora, Starbucks, Dunkin’ Donuts and The Cheesecake Factory.

OfficeMax EVP and chief digital officer Jim Barr has been elected to Shop.org’s board of directors for a two-year term.

Shop.org, the digital arm of the National Retail Federation, is the world's leading community for digital retail, offering thought leadership through original research and gold standard events. The community's exclusive networking groups and committees lead the global conversation surrounding innovative e-commerce trends and digital retail.

New York -- Saks Fifth Avenue was able to reach nearly 100% display compliance at its 8th floor shoe department in their flagship New York City store with the TrueVUE Inventory Display Execution application from Tyco Retail Solutions. Using a handheld RFID reader, associates can inventory shoes daily and generate an actionable report of all missing display shoes to replenish.