Articles By Anna Rose Welch
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Twitter Nears Deal With Stripe To Enter E-Commerce
1/22/2014
Upon the deal’s completion, customers will be able to make purchases directly through Twitter. Social media has become a necessary means for retailers to advertise and engage with brand customers. However, last week, news surfaced suggesting that social network Twitter is preparing to engage users on another level. According to re/code, Twitter is now very close to throwing its hat into the e-commerce ring, as it is nearing a deal with payments startup Stripe. Once this deal is completed, users would be able to purchase goods directly through the social network via credit card.
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Amazon Tests A Physical Channel With Kindle Kiosks
1/21/2014
Online retail behemoth Amazon has begun invading the physical retail world with standalone, automated “Kindle Kiosks.” The company chose a soft launch of these experimental kiosks for its e-reader, tablets, and accessories which began in November.
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Report Says Ebay Launching Online Mall, “The Plaza”
1/21/2014
Rumors abound about the tricks eBay has up its sleeve in the upcoming months. According to one report from Macquarie Capital, the marketplace is planning to launch a new vertical this spring called The Plaza. While details about this launch are sparse, Macquarie analyst Ben Schachter says that this new site would allow brands to sell direct to consumers via eBay, but in a more controlled area than the traditional eBay marketplace. So far, despite the lack of details, The Plaza has been compared to Alibaba’s Tmall — an online mall that has more than 70,000 digital storefronts, including Nike, Gap, and most recently, Apple. Analysts say this could be an important move for the company, not only to compete with Tmall, but because it would enable brands to “access eBay’s customers without having to worry about weakening their brand.”
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Best Buy Hit Hard By Promotional Holiday Season
1/21/2014
Best Buy is yet another retailer to join the ranks of those hit hard by the promotional atmosphere of this most recent holiday season. The retailer reports that sales for the nine weeks that ended Jan. 4 were roughly $11.5 billion, down from $11.8 billion during the holiday period last year. According to the company’s CEO Hubert Joly, the company’s performance this holiday was impacted primarily by excessive promotions and by slowing smartphone sales. Joly says, “In both channels, the promotional intensity that began with Black Friday continued throughout the period, which led us and our competitors to answer one question — do we make the incremental investment necessary to be price competitive and defend our market share?” And, of course, the answer was yes, but it came at a “higher-than-expected cost,” the retailer said.
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Consumers More Willing To Open Up To Retailers, Study Finds
1/17/2014
IBM finds consumers are willing to share more if it results in better deals. Retailers looking to reach out to customers with more personalized deals have good news in a new IBM Study. After surveying 30,000 global consumers, IBM has found that consumers will open up to retailers and provide some personal data, especially if they’re going to get some value from it.
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Ascena Retail Group Customers Chose “Clicks” Over “Bricks” This Holiday Season
1/16/2014
While slow store sales troubled the company this season, Ascena saw an increase in e-commerce. Like many retailers, Ascena Retail Group — which operates as Lane Bryant, Dress Barn, and Maurice’s, among others — had a disappointing holiday season. The company’s financial results for November and December were lower than expected and have led the company to decrease its full-year sales projections as a result. Comparable store sales for its five brands (including both store and e-commerce) showed mixed rates of success. Justice was down 3 percent while Maurice’s came in flat for the holiday season. Lane Bryant and Catherine’s performed the best this season, showing increases of 8 percent and 13 percent respectively, while Dressbarn comps went up 1 percent. Total sales for the company were only up by 1 percent, while comps decreased 2 percent.
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Sears Reports Disappointing Holiday Sales
1/16/2014
Despite more troubling financial results, Sears sticks by its loyalty program investments after customer engagement reaches new holiday high. Sears reported more losses coming out of the holiday season this year, adding more weight to its burden as the company continues to cut away the excess to turn business around. Following the holiday season, Sears reported declines in comparable store sales of 9.2 percent while Kmart saw comps decrease 5.7 percent. Overall, Sears saw a combined loss of 7.4 percent.
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Holiday Sales Increased 3.8 Percent, In Line With NRF Expectations
1/15/2014
While the NRF is optimistic that holiday sales reveal a growing economy, many retailers face dwindling profits from aggressive promotions. The NRF reported Tuesday that December retail sales came in as expected: sales increased 3.8 percent to $601.8 billion, only a tiny bit less than the NRF’s projected 3.9 percent to $602 billion. For the month, sales excluding restaurants and automobiles increased 0.4 percent. Online and e-commerce sales hit 95.7 billion, roughly a 9 percent increase over last year.
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Urban Outfitters Reports Record Holiday Sales
1/14/2014
While many retailers are lowering their full year outlooks following the highly promotional holiday season, Urban Outfitters announced that it had a successful holiday season for the two-month period ended December 31. The company reports record net sales, increasing 8 percent to $716 million. While comparable retail segment sales were a bit lower for the Urban Outfitter’s brand, its other two brands Free People and Anthropologie saw “outstanding” increases of 21 percent and 11 percent respectively, despite the highly promotional atmosphere, CEO Richard Hayne says.
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Neiman Marcus Joins Target In Announcing Holiday Security Breach
1/14/2014
Last week, as Target was announcing that its already extensive data theft was much larger than the company anticipated, another retailer announced that it, too, was the victim to a security breach. Neiman Marcus has joined Target as a victim of data theft this holiday season. The company has acknowledged that it is working with the U.S. Secret Service, credit card companies, a payment processor, and an investigations and forensics firm to investigate the breach, which occurred mid-December during the busy holiday shopping season. The company has not said how many debit/credit cards were affected by this breach, however it has begun to notify customers whose credit card information has been “used fraudulently.” While it is a strange coincidence that the attack occurred during the same time frame as the Target breach, the company has no evidence to suggest that this breach is in any way connected to Target’s.