News

Nashville, Tenn. -- GBT Realty Corporation announced it acquired a 13.1-acre site along Memorial Blvd in Murfreesboro, Tennessee for $2.4 million. The company plans to develop the site into The Shoppes of Northgate, a 98,000-sq.-ft. center anchored by a 30,000-sq.-ft. Sprouts Farmers Market, along with retail tenants PetSense, Liquor Barn and Newk’s Eatery. The construction of the $16 million retail center is expected to begin this month with store openings set for spring 2016.

Retailers looking to make their in-store customer experience more appealing can take a few basic technology-enabled steps.

According to a new survey of 1,000 U.S. and Canadian consumers from iVend Retail and CitiXsys Americas Inc., 71% of respondents agree or strongly agree that shopping online is more convenient than shopping in a store, with 24% saying shopping in a store is a letdown after shopping online.

The National Retail Federation called on Congress to reject a customs reauthorization bill set for a vote this week unless it includes a provision allowing states to require online merchants to collect sales tax the same as local stores.

Former Target CMO Michael Francis will reportedly serve as a marketing consultant at Walmart when the retailer’s current CMO steps down.

The Wall Street Journal reported that Stephen Quinn will retire as executive VP and CMO in January after spending nearly a decade at the Walmart. Francis, who spent 27 years with Target, is expected to join Walmart to initiate a broad marketing revamp and work closely with Quinn’s successor, The Journal said, citing a person it said was familiar with the situation.

New technologies, new products, new consumer preferences — change always threatens to disrupt the status quo, and the retail landscape is no different. The trick is to determine which trends are passing fads and which have real staying power.

To help, we asked six experts from the Daymon Worldwide family of companies (Interactions is a subsidiary of Daymon Worldwide) to share their predictions for trends that will have the biggest impact on the U.S. retail environment in 2016.

Improved Transparency and Distribution

While athleisure apparel is still quite trendy these days, the creator of the trend, Lululemon Athletica, is struggling to grow profits as competitors threaten its value proposition.

For the third quarter ended Nov. 1, the company posted a profit of $53.2 million, or 38 cents a share, down from $60.5 million, or 42 cents a share, a year earlier. Revenue rose 14% to $479.8 million. Same store sales rose 6% for the second quarter in a row on a constant-currency basis.

Doug Tompkins, the founder of the North Face and Esprit apparel companies, died Tuesday in a kayaking accident in Chile. He was 72.

Tompkins was boating with others on a lake in Chile when his kayak capsized. Tompkins was rescued but spent a lengthy amount of time in the freezing water. He died of hypothermia in a hospital in Coyhaique.

Tompkins founded The North Face in 1964 as an outdoor outfitter and in 1968 he co-founded Esprit clothing, which would grow to do a billion dollars in sales. 

Women’s lifestyle brand and retailer Vera Bradley is the latest company to feel the negative sales effects of weaning shoppers off promotions, but the strategic shift has done wonders for the company’s bottom line.