News

LOS ANGELES — Walgreens has partnered with NBC to launch a new web series inspired by NBC’s hit weight-loss competition series "The Biggest Loser."

The series follows former contestant Filipe Fa's journey to lose weight and keep it off once and for all.

INDIANAPOLIS — Frigidaire and Hhgregg are encouraging customers to get more organized through a special sweepstakes offering daily prizes and Frigidaire’s french door refrigerators through April 27.

Throughout the sweepstakes a $100 gift card will be awarded daily. Frigidaire french door refrigerators in 28 cu. ft. and 27 cu. ft. sizes will be awarded to the grand prize and first and second prize winners, respectively.

London -- Brooks Brothers will adopt eCommera’s decision intelligence tool, DynamicAction. Designed to turn big retail data into prioritized actions, the solution integrates siloed data into a commerce-specific cloud solution which will allow the retailer to identify optimization opportunities to improve its overall online commerce performance.
 

Issaquah, Wash. -- Costco Wholesale Corp reported a 4% rise in same-store sales, missing analysts' expectations for a 5.2% increase. The company said its results were negatively impacted by lower fuel prices and a strong dollar, which hurt the value of its sales overseas.

Net sales at Costco rose 7%to $9.67 billion for the five-week period ended April 7.

Camp Hill, Pa. — Rite Aid  reported a $123.1 million profit for the fourth quarter and a $118.1 million profit for the fiscal year, compared with respective losses of $161.3 million and $368.6 million during the same period last year. It was the drugstore chain's second-straight quarterly profit and first annual gain in six years, amid  increases in prescription count  and front-end end sales.

Fort Worth, Texas -- Pier 1's fourth-quarter earnings fell 46% compared with last year, when the chain recorded a large, one-time tax benefit.

The company earned $61.7 million in the three months that ended March 2, compared with $115.2 million in last year's quarter. Revenue rose 16% to $551.6 million. Same-store sales climbed 7.9%.

For the full year, Pier 1 earned $129.4 million on $1.7 billion in revenue.

For its current fiscal year, the chain expects to open 30 stores.

Philadelphia -- Destination Maternity its total sales for the second quarter fell 2.1% to $134.9 million from $137.8 million. The company attributed the drop to the closure of all of its remaining leased departments within Babies “R” Us stores in October, along with the closures of underperforming stores.

Despite the sales drop, Destination Maternity said it now expects its second-quarter profit to fall in the top half of its previously projected range of 38 cents to 44 cents per share, crediting tight management of its expenses.

New York -- L.Brands, parent of Victoria's Secret, reported better-than-expected 3% sales in same-store sales for March. Zumiez Inc. and Buckle Inc. also both reported better-than-expected numbers.

But other retailers were hampered by a colder-than-normal March, which caused many shoppers to put off buying warmer-weather clothing, and an early Easter. At The TJX Companies, same-store sales fell 2% in March, a bigger drop than was expected.

By Ellis Verdi, president of the NYC advertising agency DeVito/Verdi

Here are the five lessons I learned from the J.C. Penney debacle — unfortunately we knew all of this before Ron took his ideas to market.

FORT WORTH, Texas — Pier 1 Imports reported net income of $61.7 million, or 58 cents per share, for its fourth quarter. For the fourth quarter ended Feb. 25, 2012, the company reported net income of $115.2 million, or $1.04 per share.