For the last year or so, Target, America’s other national big-box discount store, has been struggling. Its leaders blamed falling sales on shoppers renovating their houses, on lower traffic to pharmacies after they were sold to CVS, and on customers’ general disinterest in shopping. In the last year, Target refocused on fundamentals instead of retail innovations, and that has paid off in more customer traffic and improved sales. [More]
brands
Report: Only One Bidder Wanted The RadioShack Brand And Mailing Lists
By 7.19.17
You have to feel kind of sorry for RadioShack. After filing for Chapter 11 bankruptcy for the second time in two years, the once-ubiquitous electronics chain has fewer than 100 corporate stores. Now the brand has a new owner after only one bidder was interested in buying the brand and its intellectual property. [More]
Is Sephora Killing The Department Store Beauty Counter?
By 5.11.17
While mall staples and department stores continue to close their doors this year, one subset within the retail industry is enjoying higher sales and decent foot traffic: beauty products. But it’s not the traditional makeup counter inside your local department store that’s become a hot spot for customers, it’s the tech-heavy, try-before-you-buy beauty-specific stores like Sephora and Ulta. [More]
Macy’s Sell Frango Chocolate Brand To Garrett Popcorn Owner
By 1.30.17 — Updated: 1.31.17
More than a decade after Macy’s inherited much-adored chocolate brand Frango from Marshall Field & Co., the struggling department store is selling the label to the owner of Garrett Popcorn. [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]
Fiat Chrysler Brands & Vehicles Make Poor Showing In Latest Owner Satisfaction Survey
By 12.22.16
There are dozens of car, truck, SUV, and minivan brands to choose from, but one carmaker is bringing up the rear in the latest owner satisfaction survey from our colleagues at Consumer Reports. [More]
10 Fictional Brands Hollywood Loves To Use In Movies & TV
By 8.10.16
We’ve all had that moment where a character on TV or in a movie picks up a generically branded beer, or pulls out a package of cigarettes emblazoned with a logo that looks nothing like anything offered in the real world. [More]
L’Oreal Expands Makeup Portfolio With $1.2B Purchase Of IT Cosmetics
By 7.22.16
Cosmetics biggie L’Oreal just got a bit bigger, adding some 300 skincare and makeup products with its $1.2 billion acquisition of infomercial fave IT Cosmetics.
[More]
American Girl Will Move And Experiment With Its Store In NYC, ‘Evolve As A Total Brand’
By 5.12.16
Visiting an American Girl Doll store is an amazing bit of “experiential retail,” which is a thing that people actually say. The stores offer a historical fiction and a highly customizable world designed around school-age girls. The company’s flagship store in Manhattan is at the end of its lease, and is moving to a space in Rockefeller Center that will be even more easily found by tourists. It will include a “media studio,” massive party rooms, and other features for an immersive brand-centric experience. [More]
AB InBev To Sell SABMiller’s Eastern European Brands For $8B
By 4.29.16
Anheuser-Busch InBev’s pending $107 billion merger with SABMiller will now include fewer brands: the beer behemoth announced today that it will sell several of its betrothed’s eastern European assets in order to appease federal regulators and speed up approval for the mega-merger. [More]
Target Launches Gender-Neutral Home Decor For Kids
By 2.8.16
Target’s gender-neutral approach to children’s toys is seeping into other aspects of the retailer’s business. Over the weekend the big box store unveiled a new brand of kids’ home decor that comes without boy or girl designations. [More]
See Ya, Scion: Toyota To Absorb Youth-Focused Brand After 13 Years
By 2.3.16
Starting later this year, Scion will join a long list of vehicle brands — think Mercury, Pontiac, Oldsmobile, Saturn — in the dustbin of history, as Toyota plans to end production of the brand after 13 years. [More]
Hilton Targeting Young, Budget-Conscious Travelers With New “Tru” Hotel Brand
By 1.25.16
The long list of hotels operating under the Hilton brand will be growing by one this year: joining the likes of Hilton Garden Inn, Hampton Inn, Homewood Suites, and Home2 Suites is new, budget- and millennial-focused Tru. [More]
Twitter Reportedly Working On Platform That Turns Users’ Tweets Into Ads
By 1.12.16
Take a quick look at Twitter at any given time and you’re sure to see a slew of brands, or celebrities and other influencers, shilling products and services with short 140-character messages. While promotional Tweets might be easy to spot now, they could be more difficult in the future, as the social media platform is reportedly working on a new product that would turn everyday users’ Tweets into ads for brands. [More]
Amazon May Launch Its Own Clothing Brand To Offer More Options For Customers
By 10.28.15
Back in May, Amazon announced it was toying with the idea of creating its own house brand for everyday items like cereal and diapers. Not content to just stay in your cabinets, the e-commerce giant is apparently on the verge of infiltrating our closets with its own private-label fashion line. [More]
Will Mega Beer Merger Lead To Higher Prices & Fewer Choices For Consumers?
By 10.27.15
With a $104.2 billion merger agreed to in principle, beer giants Anheuser-Busch InBev and SABMiller could be walking down the aisle soon, creating a company that provides nearly 70% of the beer sold in the U.S. While such a mega-merger might be beneficial to the companies as far as increasing market share and cutting costs, the deal could have some very real consequences for consumers – and other beer producers. [More]
Facebook Launches Feature That Lets Users And Businesses Message Each Other
By 8.5.15
After Facebook announced in March that it’d be launching a pilot program with a few brands that would let customers and companies communicate privately, the social media network said Wednesday that it’s expanding the rollout of Messenger for businesses. [More]
Report: AT&T Wireless Program To Let Subscribers Get Free Data From Advertisers
By 6.11.15
Data is a precious resource for mobile consumers and the wireless companies that serve them. The two are always in a trade-off: data caps, overage pricing, unlimited plans, zero-rating… there are loads of different iterations (and shenanigans) in that sphere. And now, reports indicate AT&T might be trying out a new one. [More]
