Data & Analytics

SILVER SPRING, Md. — Discovery Communications announced that has named formed Liz Claiborne executive Andrew Warren to the position of senior EVP and CFO. Warren will join Discovery on March 26, and will be based at the company's global headquarters in Silver Spring, Md. Warren succeeds Brad Singer who previously announced that he is leaving Discovery at the end of March.

Dallas -- Zale Corp. reported Tuesday that same-store sales for the holiday selling season of November and December 2011 rose 5.9%, compared with an 8.5% gain in the same period last year.

Within the two-month period, same-store store sales increased 10.1% in November and 4.2% in December.

Revenues for the two-month period were $564 million, compared with $533 million in the same period last year, an increase of 5.8%.

New York City -- Shopping centers in the United States had their first net gain in occupied space in four years amid a rise in consumer confidence and job growth, according real estate research firm Reis Inc., Bloomberg reported.

Neighborhood and community shopping shoppers saw a net increase of 3.18 million sq. ft. in the fourth quarter, the most since 10.1 million sq. ft. in the last three months of 2007.

Armonk, N.Y. -- On Tuesday, IBM released its final Benchmark announcement for the 2011 holiday season, detailing a continued strong performance for mobile as well as an overall increase in online spending for December 2011.

According to the report, the U.S. online retail sector delivered 7.5% growth in December 2011 compared to the same period last year. This followed a strong November where both Black Friday 2011 and Cyber Monday 2011 delivered double-digit growth over 2010.

Other key findings of the IBM report included:

Following a wild ride during Black Friday, the last month of the year in 2011 saw most retailers maintaining similar levels of promotional activities when compared to 2010. The majority of advertisers either saw slight increases in circular and page counts or stayed flat. When looking at both page counts and circular drops overall there was not much change, with a 2% decrease in number of pages and a 1% drop in number of inserts per market. 

The annual consumer electronics extravaganza known as CES gets underway in Las Vegas today, and in conjunction with the show’s kick off Market Research Solutions (MRS) is out with a new report that provides some unconventional insights into the 2011 holiday season and outlook for 2012.

By Mike Romano, [email protected]

Redwood Shores, Calif. -- American Apparel has chosen Oracle ATG Web Commerce and Oracle ATG Web Commerce Customer Service applications to help grow its global, multi-channel retail business. The apparel retailer will use Oracle's ATG Web Commerce to personalize the customer experience across all channels, including the web, contact center, mobile devices, social media and in stores.