News

GameStop gets into the collectibles business
Online retailer ThinkGeek is teaming up with GameStop on a new concept retail store focused entirely on collectibles.

The first store will open in the Florida Mall in Orlando on Sept. 25.
Study: Shoppers get smart with mobile
Scottsdale, Ariz. – Shoppers keep getting smarter about using their mobile devices.

According to a new study from OneStop Marketing, 83% of mobile users now engage in shopping activities on their phone immediately before, during or after a trip to the store.

In addition, 45% of online traffic during the 2014 holiday season came from mobile but only 20% of sales came from mobile devices, indicating a substantial opportunity to increase mobile conversion rates.

Guitar Center promotion is a hit

Guitar Center has crowned the winner of its Cover Me promotion, which aims to jump-start the career of amateur musicians.

The retailer along with DJ Zedd have selected Tyler Acord, aka Scout, as the winner of Guitar Center's Cover Me contest.
Cool clothes in a high-tech store setting

New York -- Rebecca Minkoff has brought its “Store of the Future” concept to Los Angeles.
IHL: One vendor dominates hardgoods POS market

Franklin, Tenn. – Unlike the softgoods retail POS market where there are two leading vendors, one vendor clearly dominates the POS market for hardgoods retailers.

According to the new “POS Software of Hardgoods” study from IHL Group, Oracle is the clear market leader in the hardgoods market, with 39 of the top 200 accounts.
Millennials choose retailers for different reasons than elders

Los Angeles – Millennial consumers choose retailers based on different criteria than their elders. A survey of more than 13,000 e-commerce shoppers by Bizrate Insights found that millennials are by far the most price-sensitive with low pricing driving their choice of retailer.
NRF’s new playbook offers holiday help

Retailers will reveal their 2015 holiday strategies in the weeks ahead and as they do so the National Retail Federation is offering a powerful new resource filled with industry best practices to benchmark against for this year and beyond.

The newly released document is called the 2015 Holiday Planning Playbook and was compiled by top retailers over the course of the past year who served on various NRF councils focused on retail industry disciplines.
This e-retailer has digital innovation in the bag

Ebags is quickening the pace of its digital innovation by teaming up with Iterate Studio to create two new tech research labs.

Recognized by retailers as an early pioneer of drop-ship (1999), customer product reviews (1999), and A/B split testing (2000), eBags' goal is to pioneer game-changing services by embracing the new digital frontier which includes mobile services and the Internet of Things (IoT).
Lowe’s Canada to reward customers with air miles

Toronto -- Shoppers at Lowe’s stores in Canada will soon be able to turn their purchases into miles toward air travel.

Lowe's Canada and LoyaltyOne Co., owner and operator of the Air Miles Reward Program, announced an agreement to launch the reward program with an anticipated full roll-out to Lowe's stores in Canada beginning on Dec. 1.
Canadian Lowe’s customers will be able to earn Air Miles reward miles at all Canadian Lowe's retail locations and for purchases online at Lowes.ca.
HEB joins Instacart bandwagon

Regional supermarket operation H-E-B wants to make its customers lives’ better and believes its new relationship with Instacart accomplishes that objective.

H-E-B is the latest retailer to reach an agreement with grocery delivery service provider Instacart to offer home delivery in the Austin and Houston markets.