Following the news of major store closing by fellow retailers Sears, Kmart, and Macy’s, the retail carnage continues with The Limited. After weeks of having liquidation and store-closing sales without admitting its demise, the retailer has finally confirmed it will shutter all of its remaining physical stores on Sunday, Jan. 8, and exist henceforth as an online-only merchant. [More]
Retail Services
Starbucks Ends Boozy ‘Evenings’ Menu At 439 Locations
By 1.6.17
Turns out that people want coffee at coffee shops and beer and wine at other places. Eighteen months after Starbucks expanded its “Evenings” menu of booze and small bites, the company plans to pull the plug on the offering. [More]
Are Nestlé’s Raisinet Boxes “Recklessly” Under-Filled?
By 1.6.17
By now most Consumerist readers are familiar with the Grocery Shrink Ray, where the amount of a product in a package shrinks over time to keep the price of the product consistent without decreasing profits. Sure, that’s annoying and perhaps a bit misleading, but the Shrink Ray’s sneakier twin — slack-fill — is even worse, and now it’s the reason for a class-action seeking lawsuit against Nestlé, accusing the candy company of “recklessly” underfilling its Raisinets boxes. [More]
“Rude” Store Owner Tries To Weed Out Freeloaders By Charging $.62 “Browsing Fee”
By 1.6.17
Who among us hasn’t spent time browsing the wares at a store while knowing full well that we have no intention of spending a penny? The owner of one shop got fed up with freeloading looky-loos and has decided to start demanding money just for the pleasure of browsing. [More]
Amazon Opening Its Next Physical Bookstore In NYC This Spring
By 1.6.17
New Yorkers who like the experience of thumbing through a book made with paper and smelling the fresh ink before they buy it will have another place to browse this year. As we suspected in July, Amazon says it will open its next physical book store in Manhattan this spring. [More]
Craftsman Tool Lovers Worried For Brand After $900M Sale To Black & Decker
By 1.5.17
In a bid to keep its sinking retail ship afloat, Sears on Thursday announced the sale of its iconic tool brand Craftsman to Black & Decker for a mere $900 million. But with the change of hands, many stalwart Craftsman lovers aren’t sure if they’ll be sticking with the brand in the future. [More]
Here Are All Of The Kmart, Sears, And Macy’s Stores Closing This Spring
By and 1.5.17
It’s shaping up to be quite a depressing spring for a few retailers, after Sears Holdings announced it would be shutting down 150 Kmart and Sears stores in the next few months, and Macy’s notifying customers that 68 stores would close. Here is the list of all the stores that will be turning off the lights for good, where they are, and when they’re closing. [More]
The Price Of Your Costco Membership May Be Going Up By 10% This Year
By 1.5.17
Costco-watching industry analysts say that members of the popular warehouse store should prepare themselves for a possible hike of as much as 10% to the cost of their annual membership at some point in the coming year. [More]
Rogue Hungry Child Uses Alexa To Order $160 Worth Of Cookies, Doll House Without Parents’ Permission
By 1.5.17
You can buy just about anything using Amazon’s Alexa, including apparently four pounds of cookies and a doll house without having to ask your parents first. [More]
You Can Drive A Different Cadillac Every Day — If You’ve Got An Extra $1,500/Month
By 1.5.17
Want to cruise around town in a luxury vehicle but can’t decide which car you want to commit to? Cadillac thinks it has a solution with a new subscription service that gives members access to an array of Cadillacs for a flat monthly fee. [More]
Walmart’s Jet.com Jumping Into Shoe Game With $70M Purchase Of ShoeBuy
By 1.5.17 — Updated: 3.15.17
Following the $3 billion purchase of Jet.com, Walmart is continuing its bid to boost online sales, this time by targeting customers’ feet with the $70 million purchase of shoe-tailer ShoeBuy. [More]
Chipotle Launches “Dietary Options” Tool For Better Burrito Personalization
By 1.5.17
As the saying goes, “One man’s burrito is another man’s dietary nightmare.” And because it’s not always easy to know exactly how many calories will be in that chorizo burrito, or which ingredients are part of a particular diet — whether it’s paleo, gluten-free, dairy-free, or what have you — Chipotle has released an online tool. [More]
Sears To Sell Craftsman Brand To Black & Decker For $900M
By 1.5.17
Sears isn’t just trying to stave off the grim reaper by closing stores and borrowing hundreds of millions of dollars from CEO Eddie Lampert twice in two weeks. The beleaguered retailer is selling off its iconic Craftsman brand to Stanley Black & Decker for $900 million. [More]
Sears And Kmart Announce 150 Store Closures, Including The First Kmart
By 1.5.17
Last week, we shared a list of Kmart and Sears stores that we were able to confirm would be closing this spring. The list just grew, reaching a total of 108 Kmart locations and 42 Sears locations that will begin their store-closing sales this week. [More]
Report: Amazon, Forever 21 Interested In Buying Bankrupt American Apparel
By 1.5.17
Stores are set to shut down, thousands of employees may be laid off, but we still haven’t reached the end of the American Apparel Bankruptcy: Part II saga. In yet another plot twist, Amazon and Forever 21 are appearing as rumored new suitors ahead of the upcoming bankruptcy auction. [More]
Macy’s Announces 68 Store Closings Across The Country; Here’s The List
By 1.4.17
The holiday season is over, and it’s time for retailers to figure out exactly how terrible the holiday season was. Macy’s, which is still trying to figure out a business model for department stores in general, announced its quarterly results along with a long list of stores across the country that are closing. [More]
Retailers Ask Congress To Please Not Roll Back Dodd-Frank Debit Card Reforms
By 1.4.17
Both the banking industry and conservative lawmakers are hoping that the incoming Trump administration will agree to repeal the 2010 Dodd-Frank Financial Reforms, but many in the retail world are calling on Congress to retain at least the portion of the law involving debit card transactions. [More]
Sears Borrows Another $500 Million From Its CEO Until It Can Sell More Stores
By 1.4.17
Sears Holdings, the parent company of Sears and Kmart, has lost billions of dollars in the last few years. The last time that it did turn a profit, it was because the company had just sold a few billion dollars’ worth of store buildings to its affiliated real estate investment trust. Now the company is borrowing some cash from its CEO in anticipation of raising more money the same way. [More]
