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Academy Sports and Outdoors' 186 locations won’t be open Thanksgiving Day, but the retailer does have other operational and promotional strategies planned including a 5 a.m.Black Friday opening.

The $4 billion retailer said it was continuing its longstanding practice of not opening on Thanksgiving Day. Instead, leading up to Thanksgiving Academy plans to provide customers access to shop its Black Friday deals early through three major sales events – Early Access, Black Friday Starts Now, and Black Friday.

Framingham, Mass. -- By 2017, three times as many retailers as now will explicitly underpin their customer and operations strategies on 3rd platform technologies. That’s one of IDC Retail Insights’ top 10 worldwide retail predictions for 2015. IDC  revealed the predictions during a Web conference, IDC FutureScape: Worldwide Retail Agenda 2015 Predictions.        

In its 10th year, the Top Redevelopers survey continues to underscore the industry sea change from ground-up new-builds to redeveloping existing assets. Each year, the names of our Top Redevelopers may change, but their goals remain the same: maximize shopping center portfolios by keeping each asset current, vibrant and viable.

Last year, 37.3% of “Black Friday” consumers began shopping between 8 p.m. and 11:59 p.m. on Thanksgiving Day. Shopper traffic over the two-day Thanksgiving Day and Black Friday period at retail outlets totaled more than 1.07 billion store visits. Sales during the two-day period were $12.3 billion, and online sales grew an explosive 18.5%.

After seeing the financial benefits of opening earlier, more retailers are expected to open their doors on Thanksgiving Day to get a jump on their holiday sales.

Like an inconsiderate party guest, Old Man Winter arrived early this year, bringing his trusty cohorts snow, ice, wind and rain. The first official day of winter is still a month away, but many parts of the United States are feeling the freeze, especially in the Northern Plains, where snow fell 11 days before summer officially ended. If that is any indication of the upcoming season, retailers could be in for a long and brutal winter.

Winter Forecast

For many, winter is a magical time of the year.

Mobile technology is increasingly being used in all areas of the enterprise to create a truly seamless customer experience that starts in the back office and extends across all touchpoints. Samuel Mueller, CEO of Scandit, developer of a software-based barcode scanning solution and suite of mobile apps, recently discussed with Chain Store Age how mobile solutions are affecting every part of the retail enterprise.

San Francisco –- New Seasons Market (NSM) is deploying the new Index online commerce personalization solution at its stores to deliver end-to-end security and personalized customer experiences. The collaboration with Index provides NSM with a real-time understanding of customer behavior while helping to deliver relevant product recommendations and shopping experiences that savvy consumers now expect both online and offline.

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