News

The options for consumers who dread the store checkout lane are exploding now that fast growing Instacart is on a hiring spree and competitor Deliv says it will be expanding into more than 100 cities.

Boca Raton, Fla. – Office Depot is accelerating its previously announced plan to close at least 400 stores as the retailer awaits its acquisition by Staples.

After shuttering a greater than expected 99 stores in the second quarter, Office Depot boosted its 2015 store closing target to 175 locations, with another 60 due to close in 2016. The closings are on top of 153 closings throughout 2014, including 108 stores in the fourth quarter of last year.

New York -- Petco Animal Supplies may be headed for an initial public offering or sale.

The retailer has selected Goldman Sachs Group to help with an IPO or sale that could value the pet supplies retailer between $4 billion and $5 billion, including debt, Reuters reported.

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Retail is becoming an increasingly hot market for hosted cloud computing providers. Some of those providers, such as Amazon Web Services (AWS) and the Aliyun cloud division of Alibaba, are operated by retailers.

Shopko Stores is looking more closely at how it uses store space and how customers fill their baskets.

The retailer has renewed its license of APT’s Test & Learn and Market Basket Analyzer software and APT’s Space Planning Optimizer software. 

Deerfield, Ill. - Walgreens Boots Alliance has named Kimberly R. Scardino as its new senior VP, global controller and chief accounting officer. Scardino joins Walgreens Boots Alliance from American Express Co., where she was senior VP, business advisory controller.

After 20 years of focusing on just five states in the Midwest, Meijer is continuing an estimated $750 million investment in its sixth state -- Wisconsin -- with the opening of two more stores in Wauwatosa and Oak Creek.

Irvine, Calif. -- Billabong International has selected a retail suite from JustEnough’s retail suite of solutions to help transform its planning and replenishment processes across all its brands worldwide.