Just in time for the holiday shopping season, there was a deeply symbolic changeover at the King of Prussia mall in the suburbs of Philadelphia. What used to be a large Sears department store has assumed its final form: it’s part Dick’s Sporting Goods store and part Primark, a fast fashion retailer out of Ireland. That’s just one mall that demonstrates a trend: the institution of the anchor store is dying out in malls. [More]
Retail Services
Kmart Coupon Excludes Almost Everything Kmart Sells
By 1.4.16
Coupon exclusions are a delicate balance. When you exclude too few things, customers take advantage of the loopholes, like when Best Buy e-mailed a $50 off $100 purchase gift card and forgot to exclude gift cards. If you exclude too many things, customers will probably not bother to use the coupon at all, since they can’t tell what they can use it for. [More]
Walmart And Patti LaBelle Hope To Continue Dessert Magic With Two New Cakes
By 1.4.16
This holiday season, Walmart tried something new to move more baked goods: they created a celebrity-branded pie. The retailer, which moves a lot of groceries, teamed up with famed singer Patti Labelle to mass-produce pies loosely based on her own recipe. That product was extremely successful, and now two new products are hitting Walmart’s store shelves: a pound cake and a caramel cake. [More]
If You’ve Received The Gift Of New Gadgets, Recycle The Old Ones Or Pass Them On
By 12.31.15
Many of you are now enjoying new gadgets, whether it’s from a winter holiday present or post-holiday clearance sale self-gifting. If your new item replaced an old one, don’t throw the old one in a drawer: consider recycling it or passing it on to an organization that re-uses technology. Yep, there really is someone out there interested in your old game console and conference swag flash drives. [More]
24 Stories We Covered In 2015 That We Never Saw Coming
By 12.31.15
The following is a true story: One day, two Consumerist staffers were chatting about the work day. One said, “I can’t believe I’m writing about the legal ramifications of butt-dialing.” The other replied, “We should probably remember this conversation for a year-end story about things we didn’t expect to ever write in 2015.” A calendar alert was made, and our future selves were duly reminded. [More]
Times Square Toys’R’Us Is Full Of Empty Shelves And Sadness
By 12.30.15
Earlier this year, we learned that the huge flagship Toys”R”Us store in New York City’s Times Square would be closing after the toy-centric holiday of Christmas. Today, the store still stands, full of empty shelves and sadness. Also, there’s still a big Star Wars display. [More]
Raiders Of The Lost Walmart Still Playing Game That Shut Down In July 2014
By 12.30.15
Eventually, all things end, and that includes multiplayer online games. The game Vanguard: Saga of Heroes shut down in July of 2014, but Walmart is trying to keep its legacy alive by continuing to sell useless game discs in the discount bin for fifteen bucks. [More]
14 More Tiny Urban Target Stores Will Open In 2016-2017
By 12.29.15
Yes, Target is a chain of big-box stores, but the company sees its future in considerably smaller boxes. Instead of suburban stores of more than 100,000 square feet in the suburbs, all but one of the stores that Target has planned in 2016 and 2017 are small-format stores in urban areas across the country. [More]
Fitbit Charge Users Report Worse Battery Life After Firmware Upgrade
By 12.29.15
Usually, a firmware update makes a gadget better, not worse. That’s not what users of the Fitbit Charge HR are experiencing after the device’s most recent firmware update, though. They report that their devices will only stay charged for anywhere between three days and a few hours, when the battery lasted longer before the update. [More]
Hoverboard Catches Fire At Texas Mall, Federal Safety Officials Record 22 Explosions In 17 States
By 12.29.15
Even as the holidays wind down, so-called “hoverboards” continue to be a hot ticket at retailers and shopping malls around the country. One such busy mall happened to be in Texas where a self-balancing scooter caught fire, marking it just one of dozens of fires reported to federal safety officials in recent months. [More]
Yet Another “Hoverboard” Catches Fire While Charging, Singes Carpet In New Jersey Home
By 12.28.15
As expected, so-called “hoverboards” – that don’t actually hover at all – were a hot commodity under the Christmas tree. But for one New Jersey family, the holiday gift quickly turned from exciting new device to dangerous fire-starter after it burst into flames while charging. [More]
Target Jumps On Gift Card Exchange Bandwagon; Offers Customers Less Than Cards Are Worth
By 12.28.15
With the bulk of the holiday celebrations having come and gone, you might be sitting around the dried-out Christmas tree counting up all those random gift cards you received. While you appreciate the generosity of your friends and family, you just don’t have any desire to make a purchase with said cards. To that end, a number of retailers are willing to offer you a trade; joining the ranks of Walmart, GameStop, and Coinstar this year is Target. [More]
9-Year-Old Opens PS4 Box On Christmas Morning, Finds Block Of Wood
By 12.28.15
Christmas morning is a time for family togetherness, enjoying the delighted faces of children, and surprising loved ones with thoughtful gifts. Unfortunately, wrapping gifts and putting them under the tree until the recipient opens the box means risking a retail hazard: boxes of expensive electronics that contain notepads, bricks, picture frames, or mirrors. This is disturbingly common, and happened to a family in Massachusetts this Christmas. [More]
Williams-Sonoma Wasn’t Really Running A ‘Buy One Knife, Get 99 Free’ Sale
By 12.23.15
Some of our readers experience a modern moral dilemma: they order an item online, and multiple duplicates of that item appear on their doorstep. The retailer makes no attempt to collect the extra items, and sometimes doesn’t want to bother with getting them back. Two of our readers have experienced this recently: one changed a TV order and received an extra by mistake, and the other ordered knife and received 99 extra. That is not a typo. [More]
Kmart Loses Two Customers’ Layaway Orders, Shrugs
By 12.23.15
You might remember Kmart’s layaway fiasco of last year, when the company canceled layaway contracts out from under customers the week before Christmas, giving an outrageously long timeline for when those customers could expect refunds. A repeat of that disaster would be disastrous for Kmart’s layaway business, but it looks like something similar only happened on a micro-scale this year, affecting a few customers in North Carolina. [More]
Good News: Malls Where Rich People Shop Aren’t Dead
By 12.23.15
We’ve shared a lot of stories about dead and dying malls, and we wouldn’t blame you if you thought that the American mall is an endangered creature. Only it isn’t: high-end malls are doing just great. It’s malls in middle-class communities geared to middle-income customers that are suffering from high vacancy rates and failing tenants. [More]
Minnesota Vikings Sue Wells Fargo For Attempting To “Photo Bomb” New Stadium
By 12.23.15
When you build a new multibillion-dollar stadium for an NFL franchise, you probably want to make sure that advertisers are paying for their name on or in the building, not just near it. And you probably want to ensure that those advertisers who do pay for their name on the building aren’t being overshadowed by the neighbors. Which is why the Minnesota Vikings are suing Wells Fargo. [More]
PetSmart Creates Adorable Holiday To Promote In-Store Pickup
By 12.22.15
Retailers love the idea of customers picking their online orders up in a local store, but shoppers are starting to find it inconvenient. One store has an idea to promote the practice: PetSmart is offering a special discount on online orders that are picked up in a store tomorrow, a day when it’s too late to ship gifts purchased online. The name, “National Fetch it Day,” is unlikely to catch on with other retailers, though. [More]
