Omnichannel

Retailers have a new way to drive sales thanks to a mobile-friendly upgrade to RetailMeNot’s popular app.

RetailMeNot, operator of the nation’s largest digital offers marketplace with more than 18 million unique monthly users, introduced the first version of a new “products” section on its app that features popular items.

The new product functionality offers a deep link to retailers’ mobile optimized sites, providing a way to help retailers market specific products in addition to the other promotional capabilities offered by RetailMeNot.

Brooklyn, N.Y. – Etsy Inc. reportedly employs Big Data and artificial intelligence systems to better target individual customers with personalized offers. According to the New York Times, Etsy uses tools including an open source machine learning framework called Conjecture, as well as an open source Apache solution called Kafka and in-house Hadoop, to monitor real-time data for fast processing and storage.

Oak Brook, Ill. -- Retail Properties of America Inc. announced that Macy’s new off-price format, Macy’s Backstage, has signed a 35,200-sq.-ft. lease at Fordham Place in the Bronx, New York, as RPAI continues to execute on its remerchandising strategy of upgrading its tenancy and enhancing the dominance of its shopping centers.

It's going to be a lot easier for consumers to make meals from recipes thanks to a new partnership between food magazines and Popcart.

Bon Appetit and Epicurious have teamed up with Popcart to make recipes "shoppable," according to Ada Age. No longer will consumers have to read a recipe and make a shopping list and head to the store.

Food Lion has launched a new web site designed to make shopping, saving and planning for dinner easy for shoppers.

There has been a great deal written about omnichannel’s impact on the store, multichannel shopping behaviors and cross-channel fulfillment. What seems to have gone unreported, however, is the tremendous impact labor costs can have on profitably delivering the omnichannel shopping experiences consumers now demand.  

New York -- Another online merchant has ventured into the physical space.  Diamond and fine jewelry retailer Blue Nile has opened its first freestanding store, at Roosevelt Field Mall, Garden City, New York.

Brick-and-mortar stores are still relevant, with 87% of consumers planning to shop physical retail at least as often as they did in 2014, according to a study by TimeTrade Systems.