News

Rite Aid reported $2 billion in sales for the four weeks ended Sept. 27, representing a 4.5% increase over the comparable year-ago period.
 
Same-store sales increased 5.1% over the prior-year period, including a 2.3% lift in front-end same-store sales and growth of 6.3% in pharmacy comparable sales. Pharmacy same-store sales included an approximate 225 basis points negative impact from new generic introductions. Prescription count at comparable stores increased 4.4% over the prior-year period.
 

Denver - Location marketing provider Placeable is predicting that online sales will grow by more than 15% during the 2014 holiday season, compared to the same period the prior year, more than tripling the anticipated 4%-5% growth rate for overall holiday sales. However, Placeable expects more than 90% of holiday sales to take place in brick-and-mortar stores, with 58% of consumers shopping at a national retailer they normally don’t visit.

Other Placeable predictions for the 2014 holiday season include:

Scandit, a developer of software-based barcode scanning technology for smartphones, tablets and wearable devices, has released an integrated suite of mobile apps that aims to enhance the consumer shopping experience and retail operations.

Scandit’s Mobile App Suite for Retail provides a series of fully customizable, cross-platform mobile applications for retail employees and customers including: Clienteling, Mobile Point of Sale (mPOS), Mobile Shopping (mShopping), Self-Checkout, Shopping Lists and Procurement.
 

Austin, Texas - Based on previous savings experienced during the holiday season in 2013 and projected industry growth in 2014, U.S. shoppers have the opportunity to save more than $5 billion dollars by using deal and offer websites during the upcoming holiday season. According to a new study from RetailMeNot and Dr. Jason Abrevaya, Ph.D., economics department chair at the University of Texas at Austin, consumers have the potential to save more than $200 an hour while using RetailMeNot.com, or $34 in 10 minutes.

Hy-Vee is looking to improve operations and reduce shrink, and to that end, will be deploying Agilence’s Retail 20/20 exception reporting tool.  

"While looking for a solution we were keen on finding one that could help us improve our in-store operations, while also making exception reporting a priority," said Darren Baty, SVP and chief information officer, Hy-Vee. "After seeing Retail 20/20 in action it became clear that we would be able to reduce shrink and improve our front end with this tool."

New York -- Shoe Carnival is deploying eBay Enterprise’s integrated technology and services to streamline its omnichannel operations, including fraud protection, ship-from-store, retail order management, payments, and customer care.

Ann Arbor, Mich. -- Shoppers are planning to spend less money and purchase gifts for fewer people this holiday season compared to last year, while also maximizing their budgets through Black Friday and Cyber Monday sales and online cost comparison, according to the CFI Group 2014 Holiday Retail Spending Report: Black Friday is Back.  

Tractor Supply Co. plans to open two pet-focused stores under the new “HomeTown Pet” brand.

The new pet supply retail concepts operated by Tractor Supply Company will open in mid-November in Franklin and Fairview, cities within close proximity to the company’s headquarters.