News

The Men’s Wearhouse has signed a definitive agreement to acquire JA Holding, the parent company of the Joseph Abboud clothing brand, for approximately $97.5 million.

Average spending per school age child is expected to decline this year from 2012 levels, according to the National Retail Federation, setting the stage for heightened competition in an already intensely competitive seasonal selling period.

NRF said spending per child in grades K-12 would decline to $634 in 2013 compared to $688 last year and spending per college student would decline to $836 from $907. The trade group forecast total K-12 spending of $26.7 billion and total back-to-college spending of $45.8 billion for a combined market size of $72.5 billion.

Walter Loeb has been a part of the retail industry longer than many of the retail executives running Walmart have been alive. And he, like many retail analysts who follow the company, have marveled at its accomplishments over the years.

However, that wasn’t the case earlier this week when Loeb let Walmart have it over what he regarded as deplorable store standards.

ATLANTA — Coca-Cola’s has appointed Santander UK plc CEO Ana Botín to the company’s board of directors.

Santander UK plc is one of Britain’s leading personal financial services companies and a subsidiary of the Santander Group, the largest bank in the Eurozone.

SALT LAKE CITY — Overstock.com reported net revenue of $293.2 million for the second quarter ended June 30, a 22% increase from $239.5 million for the same quarter last year. The growth in net revenue was primarily due to a 21% increase in average order size.

LOUISVILLE, Ky. — CafePress, a proprietary print-on-demand services and e-commerce platform provider, has appointed Garett Jackson to the newly created role of CIO. Jackson is based in Louisville and will report to CEO Bob Marino.

Another sign of further improvement in the nation’s housing market were results from leading paints manufacturer and retailer Sherwin-Williams, whose net sales for the quarter ended June 30 were $2.71 billion, up 5.5% from the same quarter last year. 

Net sales in the Paint Stores Group increased 8% to $1.61 billion. The company's total net income for the quarter was $257.3 million, up 12.9% from the second quarter of 2013.

FREMONT, Calif. — Men's Wearhouse has signed a definitive agreement to acquire JA Holding, the parent company of American clothing brand Joseph Abboud, for approximately $97.5 million in cash, subject to certain adjustments. 

JA Holding is currently majority-owned by funds affiliated with J.W. Childs Associates, L.P. The transaction is expected to close in the third quarter of 2013.

Safeway digested an unprecedented amount of change during the second quarter and still managed to achieve solid profit improvement and a respectable amount of sales growth while strengthening its balance sheet.

MINNEAPOLIS — Supervalu reported net sales of $5.2 billion for the first quarter of fiscal 2014, down 1.5%, and net earnings of $85 million, or $0.34 per diluted share. 

The decrease in net sales primarily reflects a decline in identical store sales of negative 3% percent for retail food and negative 1.9% for Save-A-Lot. Identical store sales for corporately operated stores within the Save-A-Lot network were negative 1.2%.