Store Systems

Washington, D.C. – During a press conference on Tuesday, Feb. 11, the National Retail Federation called for widespread adoption of chip-and-PIN payment card technology by U.S. retailers and their partners.

“The chip validates that it’s the real card,” said Tom Litchford, VP retail technologies for NRF. The PIN provides two levels of validation.”

Hhgregg EVP and chief operating officer Gregg W. Throgmartin has resigned his position and spot on the company’s board of directors, effective March 31. Throgmartin is leaving to pursue outside interests and manage family businesses, the company said.

Austin, Texas - Whole Foods Market will offer new payment and checkout features from digital payment provider Square that allow customers to make purchases at food venues within select Whole Foods Market stores. These in-store venues, including sandwich counters, juice and coffee bars, pizzerias, and beer and wine bars, will use the Square Register and Square Stand solutions.

Chicago -- Retail CFOs are feeling more confident about the state of the consumer, forecast a 5.1% increase in total sales and a 4.8% increase in same-store sales this year, according to a new BDO USA survey. The finding marks a significant increase from the number expressing similar sentiments last year.

In the study,  a majority (63%) of CFOs indicate that they include online sales in their comparable sales projections, suggesting that some of this expected growth and optimism may be linked to the exploding popularity of e-commerce.

Indianapolis – Gregg W. Throggmartin, COO of Hhgregg Inc., has resigned as the executive VP and COO of the company and as a member of the board, effective March 31, 2014. Throgmartin is leaving Hhgregg to pursue outside interests and manage family businesses.

Hhgregg will commence a search for a new COO. In the interim, other operations officers of the company will fulfill the responsibilities of Throgmartin.

San Francisco -- Revel Systems, providers of enterprise iPad point-of-sale (POS) solutions, announced that pizza chain Pizza Patrón has selected Revel Systems as its POS solution for 100 plus store locations.

With the implementation of Revel Systems iPad POS across the Pizza Patrón franchise, stores can tap into cross-store metrics such as sales and inventory reports from one secure cloud based portal.  

Aston, Pa. -- Hastings Entertainment, a 136-unit multimedia entertainment retail chain, has signed an agreement for Actions Services Group to provide interior lighting maintenance to locations in the states of Arizona, Arkansas, Colorado, Montana, New Mexico, Oklahoma, Texas and Wyoming.

Washington, D.C. – The National Cyber Investigative Joint Task Force, a combined effort of the FBI, Secret Service, intelligence agencies, and the Department of Homeland Security, has released a report stating there is no evidence that recent data breaches in the computer networks of U.S., retailers are a deliberate attack on the U.S., economy.