Data & Analytics

Houston -- A survey released Tuesday by NPD Group found that morning and evening commutes are a peak time for super heavy users of convenience stores to visit, while moderate and light users tend to visit more during the evening commute.

Indianapolis -- MID Retail said Tuesday that Rue21 has selected its Advanced Allocation Software for Allocation and Store forecasting.

According to MID, its Advanced Allocation Software was designed to help multi-store, multi-SKU retailers increase accuracy, efficiency and profitability.

New York City -- ACI Worldwide, an international provider of payment systems, announced that it has acquired ISD Corp. to broaden the functionality of its payments solutions for retailers. ISD is a provider of secure payment management software and solutions for retailers in the United States and Canada.

With the addition of 140 customers from ISD, ACI now has more than 220 retailers worldwide running ACI payment systems.

The nation’s capital tops a list of the healthiest retail markets for 2011. The ranking, “ChainLinks/Terranomics Retail Power Rankings for 2011,” is based on the general overall health of a marketplace and includes such factors as overall economic indicators, income growth, ongoing construction, rental rate trends, and the amount of retail demand in the market.

New York City -- Dollar General Corp. reported Tuesday that its fourth quarter profit more than doubled over last year, boosted by increasing sales and traffic. The discounter generated a higher-than-expected profit of $222.5 million for the quarter ended Jan. 28, up from $87.2 million in the year-ago period. The company also gave a full-year forecast that topped analysts’ estimates.

Sales increased 9.4% to $3.49 billion, and same-store sales rose 3.8%.

Consumers today are smarter and savvier than ever. Over the past decade, the continually growing use of the Internet has made it easier and faster to comparison shop. During the “Great Recession,” shoppers learned to lean even more heavily on the Web to do research and find good deals. Now, as the economy recovers, these sharp consumers are not about to go back to their old ways. In addition, future technology advances will only make it easier for consumers to comparison shop. So what’s a retailer to do?

REDMOND, Wash. -- Target has enlisted the services of Microsoft to help run business-critical workloads for all its retail stores on 15,000 virtual machines using Microsoft virtualization and management technologies, giving its IT department greater agility and economies of scale, Microsoft announced. According to Microsoft, Target is using Windows Server 2008 R2 Hyper-V and Microsoft System Center to virtualize inventory, point-of-sale, supply-chain management, asset protection, in-store digital media and more.

NEW YORK — Following the recent sale of Walgreens' pharmacy benefit management business, Credit Suisse analysts said they are interested in the executive team's updated thinking on their healthcare strategy and plans for the $550 million in proceeds.

New York City -- Shoppers plan to wait until next year and beyond to spend generously again, a survey on Monday showed, in an early sign that rising gasoline prices could make the spring selling season tough for retailers, Reuters reported.

About three-quarters of Americans surveyed by America's Research Group said they were shopping less due to rising gas prices, with more than 62% of the participants planning to spend generously only next year or beyond.

Redmond, Wash. -- Microsoft Corp. announced Monday that Target Corp. is running business-critical workloads for all its retail stores on 15,000 virtual machines using Microsoft virtualization and management technologies, giving its IT department greater agility and economies of scale. Target has virtualized inventory, point-of-sale, supply chain management, asset protection, in-store digital media and more on Windows Server 2008 R2 Hyper-V and Microsoft System Center.