News

Food Lion keeps hunger away with millions of apples a day
Food Lion partnered with its customers and Feeding America to help provide 1.5 million meals to families in need.

Thanks to a program that began on September 17, each time a customer purchased the specially-marked apples Food Lion helped provide five meals to local food banks.
Wal-Mart cuts back U.S. supercenter growth; ups e-commerce spending
Bentonville, Ark. -- Wal-Mart Stores Inc. is planning to sharply cut back the growth of its U.S. supercenters in favor of smaller-format stores and acccelerated e-commerce and digital investments.

Report: Bank of America says Alibaba tops in e-commerce

Charlotte, N.C. –- Bank of America has reportedly released a report saying that Chinese e-commerce platform Alibaba Group Holding Ltd. is the leader in global e-commerce, followed by Amazon.com. According to Benzinga.com, Alibaba currently holds 31% of global e-commerce market share and should grow to capture 33% of global e-commerce market share in 2015.
IBISWorld: Halloween sales to reach $7.29 billion

New York -- Total Halloween sales are expected to grow 3% to total $7.29 billion in 2014, due to improving economic conditions and employment levels. According to a new study from market research firm IBISWorld Inc., costume sales are expected to rise 6% to $2.76 billion, spurred by more theme parties and social media photo sharing.
Black Friday get even blacker this year

A delayed start to the shopping season is causing consumers to postpone their holiday purchases until Thanksgiving weekend, according to the 2014 Holiday Purchase Intentions Survey from global information company The NPD Group.
Lessons Learned from Back-to-School Shopping: Three Trends Driving Peak Season Strategies

By Leela Rao-Kataria, GT Nexus When most people are asked what the busiest holiday for retailers’ is they immediately cite the traditional holiday season. But most consumers don’t realize back-to-school shopping is the second biggest shopping season in the United States. And unlike the winter holidays, back-to-school has an additional challenge for retailers: it’s the longest running holiday season, extending over three months.
Holmes to help women be beautiful

Procter & Gamble has introduced a new ad campaign for its Olay brand featuring Katie Holmes in which the actress encourages woman to be their best beautiful.

Created in partnership with Saatchi & Saatchi New York, Holmes encourages women around the world to be their best beautiful – in their lives and their skincare while featuring Regenerist and other Olay products.
Giant Eagle pilots Brickstream in-store analytics

Pittsburgh –- Multi-format food, fuel and pharmacy retailer Giant Eagle Inc. is piloting smart devices from Brickstream for capturing and analyzing in-store data at six stores. Brickstream’s hardware and software solutions deliver the equivalent of “clickstream” analytics for the brick-and-mortar world.
Amazon’s video app targets Dropbox and Google Drive

Amazon Cloud Drive users now have access to their personal videos and photos from connected devices on the Amazon Instant Video app.

The feature is now available on PlayStation 3 and 4 along with select LG and Samsung smart TVs across the U.S., U.K. and Germany.
Report: Only 5% of retailers have fully executed omnichannel strategy

Minneapolis -- Few companies (5%) believe they are “advanced” when it comes to omnichannel capabilities, and between 35% and 40% believe they are lagging, according to a report by SPS Commerce, a provider of enterprise retail cloud services. The company’s third annual “Retail Insight” report confirms the cross-functional challenges retailers, suppliers and logistics firms face as they build omnichannel capabilities into their operations.