OPERATIONS / SUPPLY CHAIN

Washington, D.C. - Amazon.com, Inc. has billed parents and other account holders for millions of dollars in unauthorized in-app charges incurred by children, according to a Federal Trade Commission complaint filed today in federal court. The FTC's lawsuit seeks a court order requiring refunds to consumers for the unauthorized charges and permanently banning the company from billing parents and other account holders for in-app charges without their consent.

Cincinnati - The Kroger Co. has published its eighth annual sustainability report, setting its first-ever water conservation goal and providing a progress update on moving retail locations toward "zero waste" and sourcing 100% certified sustainable palm oil. Since 2000, Kroger has reduced energy consumption by nearly 35%. It has 557 Energy Star certified store locations and another 517 that are eligible.

Highlights of the report include:

Burlington, Mass. -- Demandware, a leading provider of enterprise cloud commerce solutions, announced that fashion and lifestyle brand Trina Turk is using the Demandware Commerce platform as the digital foundation for its commerce operations. Trina Turk, which re-launched its ecommerce site  earlier this year with the Demandware platform, is leveraging Demandware to provide seamless shopping experiences across web, mobile and other distribution channels.

Washington, D.C. - The National Retail Federation (NRF) has hired Paul G. Martino as VP and senior policy counsel, and promoted Beth Provenzano to VP for federal government relations. Martino and Provenzano will work with the NRF Government Relations Department and focus on emerging public policy priorities, including data security, payments, mobile and e-commerce, privacy and patent reform.

Monroe, Mich. -- La-Z-Boy Inc. announced the promotion of Daniel King to president of the company's retail Segment. He has served as VP of La-Z-Boy's retail operations since July of 2011.

In his new role as President, King will be responsible for all facets of the company-owned La-Z-Boy Furniture Galleries stores, including sales, store operations, training and merchandising functions. The company owns 101 of the 315 stores and, in fiscal 2014 the segment recorded approximately $300 million in sales.

Pleasanton, Calif. - Safeway has released its sixth annual sustainability report, informed by the Global Reporting Initiative G3 Guidelines. The online report, titled "Heart of Safeway," includes 2013 performance highlights such as hiring 1,833 military veterans and scoring 100% in the Human Rights Campaign Buyer's Guide and Corporate Equality Index

Other highlights include:

New York -- Ron Johnson, who has been keeping a low profile since he was ousted from J.C. Penney in April 2013, made a rare guest appearance at Stanford University. Johnson, a graduate of Stanford and a member of its board, was a guest speaker at the university's View From the Top series in May, where he discussed with Stanford Graduate School of Business students Penny, Apple and Target and the lessons learned over his career in retail.

Dodgeville, Wis. -- Lands’ End has brought on San Francisco-based Secret Sauce Partners to help improve the retailer’s online shopping experience.

Lands’ End has deployed Secret Sauce’s Fit Predictor service, which proactively finds a customer's best fit in seconds using existing data, without the need for physical measurements.