News

Urban Outfitters has gone big — really big — in New York City, opening a 57,000-sq.-ft. “lifestyle center” store in Manhattan’s Herald Square area. The space, the brand’s largest location to date, is big on in-store shops and includes such extras as a hair salon, bookshop, coffee bar and photography shop (with a booth for printing Instagram snapshots). All this is featured along with Urban’s menswear, womenswear and home collections.

Menlo Park, Calif. -- Facebook Inc.’s revenue in the second quarter increased 61% to a better-than-expected $2.91 billion, up from $1.81 billion in the year-ago quarter, fueled by its fast-growing mobile advertising business.

Revenue from advertising was $2.68 billion, up 67% from last year. Mobile advertising revenue represented 62% of Facebook’s ad revenue in the second quarter, up from 41% in the year-ago period and 59% in first quarter 2014. Payments and other fees revenue was $234 million, a 9% increase from the same quarter last year.

O’Reilly Automotive, the nation’s second largest auto parts retailer, said it is on track to open 200 new stores this year after posting its 22nd consecutive quarter of profit growth in excess of 15%.

Walmart named Greg Foran president and CEO of its U.S. stores division to replace Bill Simon, who is leaving the company after an eight-year run.
 

Walgreens president of pharmacy, health and wellness Kermit Crawford is leaving the company after 31 years to take on new opportunities, including continuing to serve as a senior counselor to Walgreens president and CEO Greg Wasson.

Sears Canada has added EVP and operating chief Klaudio Leshnjani to the board of directors, following the sudden passing of H Ronald Weissman.

Weissman has served as a member of board since Nov. 2013 and was a member of the audit committee.

Leshnjani held several executive positions with the company, including EVP, chief administrative officer and general counsel, EVP, financial and home services, human resources, general counsel and corporate communications and SVP and general counsel.

Supervalu posted $5.23 billion in net sales for the first quarter, a decrease of 0.1% from $5.24 billion last year; but president and CEO Sam Duncan expressed confidence in the company’s performance, saying it is off to a solid start across business segments.

“Our first quarter results reflect the investments we are making this year to position the company for future success and I am pleased with our operating performance,” said Duncan.

Tablet point of sale company ShopKeep unveiled a redesigned website, logo and tagline earlier this week. The rebranding is intended to accompany ShopKeep’s growth since it started six years ago, and new features such as customized email receipts.
 
According to ShopKeep CEO Jason Richelson, the company’s new look “respects where we’ve come from but better reflects where we are, and where we intend to go as a company.”

Despite a still-challenging economic climate, Loblaw’s profit in the second quarter beat analysts’ expectations, and was bolstered by strong sales in its recently acquired Shoppers Drug Mart.

Sales at the pharmacy and beauty retailer, which contributed to Loblaw’s net sales for the first time this quarter, accounted for more than a quarter of the food retailer’s total sales of C$10.31 billion in the quarter.

Revenue optimization services provider Extraprise is rebranding as QuickPivot and launching a new real-time, cross-channel marketing platform to support lifecycle marketing.

The new QuickPivot platform enables marketers to derive customer insight, listen to brand interactions and then adapt campaigns with highly optimized messages and offers to create seamless buying experiences.