News

COLUMBUS, Ohio — Following a difficult start to the year, leading branded footwear and accessories retailer DSW has rebounded with an increase in sales that resulted in solid quarterly profit results for the second quarter ended Aug. 3. 

The company reported sales of $562 million for the quarter, up 9.7% from $512 million for the prior-year period. Comparable-store sales increased 4.4% for the quarter on top of the prior-year quarter’s 4.2% increase.

Retailers tapping into technology to maximize in-store labor during the busiest season

Let the games begin.

Retailers are gearing up for the Super Bowl of the holiday-selling season, when stores generate up to 40% of their annual sales and boost their staffs in light of the heightened shopping spree.

As technology reshapes the retail landscape at a dizzying pace, it’s also advancing the art and science of aligning sales and traffic patterns with in-store labor — particularly crucial during the make-or-break winter selling period.

Des Moines, Iowa — The Des Moines Area Community College opened its school year with a new campus: a 65,000-sq.-ft. former J.C. Penney store located on the main level of Southridge Mall.

The mall’s owner, Macerich sold the space to DMACC for $1. The school, which has three other campuses in the Des Moines metro area, has invested $13 million in design, construction, equipment, labs and classrooms. Major donations will be announced this fall.

It could be a smaller-store footprint. Or a design makeover. Or a totally new format. But there comes a time when even the largest and most successful retailers need to freshen up or rethink their store identities. Here's a look at four brands that are trying on new looks.

Richfield, Minn. -- Best Buy Inc.’s founder and largest shareholder, Richard Schulze, plans to sell off an unspecified portion of his 20% stock holdings in the chain, according to a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission.  

The move is part of Schulze's “personal long-term strategy for asset diversification and liquidity,” according to the filing, which did not disclose the total number of shares expected to be effected by the sale.

ATLANTA — Diet Coke is launching a limited-edition T-shirt available exclusively in Target stores.

The T-shirt is the winning design from the second season of the Diet Coke Young Designer Challenge. Part of the brand’s “Stay Extraordinary” platform, the challenge required participants to create an original T-shirt design inspired by Taylor Swift’s style and people who drink Diet Coke. Hundreds of designs from across the country were submitted.

Widening competition for commodity grocery sales is changing grocery-anchored shopping centers.

Supermarket-anchored shopping centers haven't changed much since the invention of suburbia. Find a good location, sign a grocery anchor, get a construction loan and some inline local, regional and maybe national retailers, and you're in business.

Today, however, supermarkets are beginning to change, and supermarket-anchored shopping centers, of course, must follow along.

Why are grocers changing? Competition from all sides.

Columbus, Ohio -- DSW Inc. improved upon its results from the second quarter of fiscal 2012 in the second quarter of this fiscal year, reporting increases in net income, sales and same-store sales. The company had net income of $33.7 million, including net after-tax losses and charges, a 15% boost from reported net income of $29.3 million a year earlier.

In addition, net sales rose 9.7% to  $562 million. Same-store sales increased 4.4%.