News

Meijer investing in new stores, remodels
Privately-owned, family-operated Meijer announced plans to invest more than $375 million in new and remodeled stores in 2017 across its six-state footprint. The investment includes the construction of seven new Meijer supercenters and 22 remodel projects. While Michigan, Indiana, and Wisconsin will each welcome new Meijer supercenters later this year, dozens of other Meijer stores have begun or will soon begin remodel projects to enhance the customer shopping experience.
Report: Amazon advances Alexa’s voice-recognition functionality
Alexa is getting personal. Amazon is reportedly working on a feature that would allow the Alexa voice assistant that powers its Echo line of speakers to distinguish between individual users based on their voice, sources familiar with the situation told Time.

Amazon: Human error caused the outage

Don’t blame it on the technology. In a blog post on its site, Amazon explained the reason why Amazon Web Services suffered a four-hour outage on Tuesday, one that caused significant problems at numerous Internet sites, including those operated by retailers.
Target shares details of $7 billion capital investment plan

Target Corp. has a lot on its plate for the next three years. Among other initiatives the retailer will open 30 small format stores in 2017, doubling its presence in urban markets and on college campuses. By 2019, Target will operate more than 130 smaller stores.
Teen retailer beats Q4 earnings but gives downbeat view

American Eagle Outfitters topped earnings expectations amid a strong performance by its Aerie division, but issued a cautious note for fiscal 2017. For the quarter ended Jan 28, the retailer reported better-than-expected earnings of $54.6 million, or 30 cents per share, down from $81.7 million, or 42 cents per share, a year earlier. Excluding one-time items, the chain has earnings of 39 cents per share, beating consensus analysts estimates by a penny.
Best Buy falls short on revenue but beats on earnings

Best Buy Corp. came up short on top line growth in its fourth quarter amid problems with product availability. But its income topped expectations, helped by operational improvements and store closures. The consumer electronics retailer on Wednesday issued a first-quarter forecast that missed Wall Street's expectations. It also detailed the next phase of its turnaround, which includes expanding its in-home advisory program, accelerating growth in Canada and Mexico, and more cost cutting.
Consumer confidence reaches 15-year high in February

The Conference Board announced a new high for consumer confidence in February, which reached its highest level since July 2001. The index now stands at 114.8, up from 111.6 in January.
How Amazon Web Services outage impacted retailers

A good number of retailers were impacted when Amazon Web Services — the company’s most profitable division — experienced a four-hour outage on Tuesday. The outage caused major headaches for millions of AWS customers, according to web monitoring and optimization firm Apica, which monitored the top 100 Internet retailer sites during the outage.
Lowe’s surges in fourth quarter

Strengthened by strong holiday performance, a steadily recovering housing market and an increasingly omnichannel approach, Lowe¹s reported fourth quarter net sales of $15.8 billion, up 19.2% from $13.2 billion in the same quarter a year ago. Net earnings for the quarter swelled to $663 million, up from $11 million in the fourth quarter of 2015. Comparable sales increased 5.1% in the quarter.
Dollar Tree comes out on top

Higher customer spending and lower costs help drive better-than-expected fourth quarter sales and profit at Dollar Tree. The discounter’s solid quarterly performance capped a year in which it opened 584 new stores and exceeded $20 billion in sales. Dollar Tree reported net sales of $5.64 billion for the quarter ended Jan. 28, up 5.0% from $5.37 billion in the year-ago period.