OPERATIONS / SUPPLY CHAIN

Four Best Practices to Make the Holiday Season Bright — with Convenience
With the rise of multichannel retailing and a saturated retail market, today’s customers expect to find the products they want, when they want and in a way that is most convenient to them. Be it via speedy delivery, in-store pickup or traditional store visits, shoppers today want to be connected to their purchases quickly. Retailers that don’t provide such services will be outperformed by competitors that do this Christmas season.
Abercrombie taps seasoned HR exec to head up diversity efforts
Abercrombie & Fitch continues its efforts to polish its brand image.

The retailer announced that Jeanetta Darno has joined the company as VP of diversity and inclusion in a role that will include “enhancing the existing global diversity and inclusion best practices throughout the organization.”

Target rolls out 8 new sustainability goals

Amid a slew of news from Target HQ on Monday, the retailer also announced that, as part of the White House’s Climate Pledge, it would be working toward eight new sustainability commitments. The company has had success so far when it comes to sustainability, reducing its greenhouse gas emissions 9% since 2012 and eliminating more than half a million metric tons of carbon dioxide from its buildings.

The commitments are for the company to achieve the following benchmarks by 2020:
Report: Target continues internal IT focus

Target Corp. is making a number of aggressive moves to become more self-reliant when it comes to IT development.

According to the Wall Street Journal, the latest move is the adoption of the DevOps software development strategy. DevOps emphasizes increased cooperation among software engineers and product deployment employees, and also focuses on agile development and testing methods.
Top retailers back Obama climate change pledge

Ikea and Best Buy are among the top retailers supporting a U.S.-sponsored pledge to act on combating climate change.

President Barack Obama met with a group of business leaders Monday at the White House to announce the signatories of the American Business Act on Climate Pledge.

"The perception is that this is an environmental issue, it's for tree-huggers, and that hard-headed business people either don't care about it or see it as a conflict with their bottom lines," Obama said.
Target starts up accelerator application process

Start-ups looking to revolutionize retail have a significant new opportunity for support.
The New Realities of Cyber Risk Management: It’s Not Just an IT Issue

Imagine you are the general counsel at a retailer involved in sensitive M&A discussions. You receive an email from one of the deal’s outside advisors. He says he needs some information about your company, the kind you’ve passed on before. You send it along — and later find that you were victimized in a sophisticated cyber-attack aimed at stealing sensitive information.
Nordstrom announces holiday hiring plans

Nordstrom plans to hire about 11,800 seasonal employees for the coming holiday season, mostly for sales and stock positions at the upscale chain and its less pricey Nordstrom Rack locations.

The retailer also plans to hire 1,600 temporary workers to support its e-commerce business at its three fulfillment centers.
Costco adds digital knowledge to its board

Costco is adding a bit of digital expertise to its ranks with its latest new board member.
Hackers victimize charity chain

The latest retail data breach demonstrates that hackers will victimize whoever is vulnerable.

America’s Thrift Stores, an Alabama-based, 18-store for-profit chain that sells donated items and then contributes a significant portion of the profit to local charities, has been breached. Hackers used malware to compromise the systems of a third-party service provider, which gave them access to the America’s Thrift Stores network.