Data & Analytics

St. Louis -- Build-A-Bear Workshop lost $2.3 million in the first quarter, compared with a profit of $1.7 million in the prior-year period.

The retailer reported revenue of $96 million for the 13 weeks ended April 2, down 5% from $101.4 million a year earlier. Same-store sales were down 9%.

The company said the quarter’s results were adversely impacted by the shift of the Easter holiday and associated school vacations, which moved into the second quarter this year.

Austin, Texas -- DMX announced it is the new music, systems and messaging partner for Bass Pro Shops.

Bass Pro Shops is using a custom mix of country music that is delivered via the DMX ProFusion technology. DMX is also providing all the sound systems for each location and will enhance the listener experience with more speaker coverage with 46 additional speakers.

Palo Alto, Calif. -- Shopkick, a leading location-based shopping app, announced that all Crate and Barrel locations across the United States will offer walk-in rewards and special deals to shoppers simply for visiting. For shoppers, that means shopkick walk-in rewards are now available in 39 states, plus Washington, D.C., and Puerto Rico, up from three states at launch in August 2010.

The national rollout comes less than five months after Crate and Barrel initially launched its shopkick trial.

Fort Myers, Fla. -- Chico's FAS is building a new Performance Optimized Data (POD) center at its distribution and fulfillment facility in Winder, Ga.

POD technology, often referred to as, "data center in a box," employs modular pre-fabricated reinforced steel containers, approximately the size of a train freight car, to house and efficiently cool vital information technology hardware.

Chelmsford, Mass. -- Retail hiring is on the rise, according to the May report of the Kronos Retail Labor Index, a family of metrics and indices that analyze the relationship between the demand and supply sides of the labor market within the U.S. retail sector.

Projections calling for a low-to-mid single-digit comp increase at Target during May don’t sound overly aggressive, but when factoring in some of the economic headwinds and uncertainties facing the U.S. economy, the sales plan begins to sound more ambitious.

Consumers are dealing with higher fuel prices, food inflation and lingering unemployment. Where $4 a gallon gas prices are headed next is big unknown, but it is only May and historically prices increase during the summer. Ouch!

Delinquency trends in Target’s credit card portfolio just keep getting better. During April, the percentage of accounts 60 or 90 days past due sank to their lowest level of the past three years. Only 2.4% of accounts were 90 days past due during April, compared with 2.6% in March and 2.9% in February. Throughout most of 2009 and early 2010, the 90-day delinquency rates was above 4% and approached 5% at times.

North Vancouver, B.C. -- Capilano Mall is using quick response (QR) codes as an option for customers to participate in the mall's "Be Our Energy Star" contest. Entrants are being asked to write down, in 100 words or less, what they are doing to be more environmentally or socially conscious for a chance to win an Energy Star-certified LCD TV and laptop valued at over $3,500.