Content about Merchandising

BENTONVILLE, Ark. — Classrooms by Walmart is the name of a new social media initiative the retailer launched Tuesday to simplify back-to-school shopping for millions of moms who view the season as an opportunity for a fresh start.

DEERFIELD, Ill. — Walgreens on Wednesday afternoon hosted a live chat on Twitter regarding its newly launched national Retail Employees with Disabilities Initiative, an in-store training program designed to help people with disabilities gain retail employment, and how that program soon will expand.

MINNEAPOLIS — Looking ahead to fiscal 2013, Supervalu will continue its focus on "hyperlocal" merchandising, value-driven pricing and its transformational remodels to build on its momentum coming out of fiscal 2012. "For us momentum is just starting to build," Craig Herkert, Supervalu president and CEO, told analysts Tuesday morning. "We enter the new fiscal year as a leaner company together with a business strategy" that will drive results, he added.

CINCINNATI — Kroger announced that Tim Brown now will be responsible for stores in western Tennessee, Kentucky, Mississippi, Arkansas and Missouri as president of the company's Delta division.

Brown, 52, has been VP operations in the company's Delta division, based in Roanoke, Va., since 2011; before that, he served as the Mid-Atlantic division's VP merchandising since 2009.

In IFC’s hit comedy series “Portlandia,” there’s a sketch in which the two main characters order chicken in a restaurant. But they don’t just order: They ask which farm the chicken came from to make sure it’s sufficiently local and whether the chicken was raised according to their exacting standards. The waiter quickly responds with a portfolio featuring the chicken’s pre-mortem photograph, biography and name (“Collin”).


GOUVERNEUR, N.Y. — Regional chain Kinney Drugs has promoted several executives in an effort to realign its merchandising department, the company said Wednesday.

Kinney, which operates stores in northern New York and Vermont, said the promotions would allow it to enhance relations with vendors and product planning and deliver improved product assortments.

WOONSOCKET, R.I. — CVS Caremark has confirmed that Jim Trappani, VP merchandising for health care and multicultural, has decided to leave the company.
 
Grant Pill has assumed the role of VP merchandising for over-the-counter healthcare and store brands.
 
In addition, Mike McEnany has been promoted to VP merchandising, consumables and multicultural. His most recent role was divisional merchandising manager for consumables.
 

Getting a product noticed by a retail buyer or a paying customer in today’s environment is difficult to say the least. Unless you are a Fortune 100 company or you are lucky enough to have a mega-media budget, just getting an appointment with a retail buyer can be difficult. Today’s buyers are so time-starved they have to be very selective in who and when they see new suppliers and products.

DEERFIELD, Ill. — Photo enthusiasts that shop at Walgreens now can enjoy same-day pickup for many of its photo gifts at more than 3,000 stores nationwide.

WOONSOCKET, R.I. — Less than a month following the departure of former EVP merchandising and supply chain Mike Bloom to lead Family Dollar, it's official — Judy Strauss Sansone will lead CVS’ merchandising team, the company announced Monday, naming the 30-year CVS veteran SVP merchandising.

ARLINGTON, Va. — More than half of retail respondents to a survey conducted by the Retail Industry Leaders Association recently reported an increase in the frequency with which organized rings committed shoplifting, and 41% saw an increase in shoplifting by individuals acting alone. As many as 64% of respondents reported an increase in theft of pharmaceutical products, according to the 2011 Crime Trends and Leading Practices Survey released Thursday by RILA.

WHAT IT MEANS AND WHY IT’S IMPORTANT — Family Dollar is on a mission to increase traffic to its stores — of which it intends to build twice as many in fiscal 2012 as it did in fiscal 2011 — and grow its market basket. That has meant a growing emphasis on what it considers its consumables business, a substantial portion of which is constituted by health and beauty aids. As part of a long-term strategy to create an improved shopping experience and enhance customer loyalty, it expanded consumables into 5,800 stores over the past year.