Amazon has stepped into many industries, not just e-commerce and online services, but actually producing its own line of Amazon branded products. There has been fear among branded consumer products companies that Amazon's efforts would severely hurt their business, but a study shows that might not be the case. Bloomberg's Spencer Soper reports: The explosion of Amazon.com Inc.’s private-label products -- batteries, baby wipes, jeans, tortilla chips, sofas -- has prompted concern that the world’s biggest online retailer could use its clout to promote these house brands at the expense of … [Read more...]

In a bid to compete with Amazon, Walmart is telling suppliers they need to accelerate their shipments. Jennifer Smith and Sarah Nassauer report in The Wall Street Journal: The retailer wants suppliers that ship full trucks of products to deliver orders within a specified two-day window 87% of the time, up from an 85% rate it targeted previously. Suppliers that fill part of a truck with their goods must hit a 70% on-time threshold, a significant jump from the previous target of 50%. Walmart also is changing how it penalizes suppliers when they make partial deliveries, an effort to make sure … [Read more...]

The United Kingdom is one of the world's most advanced e-commerce markets, and a new joint venture between Marks & Spencer and online delivery startup Ocado Group, is getting attention. Ocado is a 16 year old online grocery retailer with over 580,000 active customers. It has previously made news in the United States after Kroger, America's largest grocery business, bought 6% of the company last year. The attraction by big grocery businesses to Ocado is the company's high-tech warehousing and logistics technologies including advanced robotics and software. For Marks & Spencer, … [Read more...]

The fourth quarter was strong for Walmart, with an apparent mix of economic growth and market share gains boosting the company to solid profit and sales numbers during the holidays. Sarah Nassauer writes in The Wall Street Journal: In the U.S., the company’s comparable sales, which exclude gas but include digital sales, rose 4.2% in the January-ended quarter, adding to a string of positive quarterly sales. Walmart got a boost from strong grocery sales, online orders, as well as holiday purchases including toys. Walmart had expected quarterly U.S. comparable sales to rise at least 3% from a … [Read more...]

With the runaway success of Amazon's ad business, Walmart executives have become envious. They would like to replicate Amazon's success on their own websites. Bloomberg's Matthew Boyle reports: Walmart Inc. is big in almost every way—4,755 stores, 1.5 million employees and $380 billion in revenue in the U.S. alone. But one part of the world’s largest retailer remains minuscule. “We have a tiny ad business,” Chief Executive Officer Doug McMillon told investors in October. “It could be bigger.” With about 300 million shoppers visiting its stores each month, according to Forrester … [Read more...]

With American shopping malls suffering from growing use of e-commerce by shoppers, store space that has been vacated by bankrupt retailers is being converted to space for other types of tenants. Among those new lessees are the logistics operations of the very  e-commerce companies beating brick and mortar retailers into submission. CNBC's Lauren Thomas reports: An old Toys R Us store in Milwaukee is now home to Engine & Transmission Exchange, a remanufacturer for car parts. Meanwhile, six dead malls across the U.S. are either in the process of being turned into or have been revamped as … [Read more...]

Amazon and Walmart (owner of Flipkart) are India's two largest e-commerce companies. New ownership rules coming into effect in India are about to hammer their businesses. Bloomberg's Saritha Rai reports: Amazon.com Inc. and Walmart Inc. suffered a blow in India, the next frontier of e-commerce, when the government rejected requests to defer a deadline requiring online retailers to comply with tighter new rules starting on Friday. That means Amazon and Walmart-owned Flipkart, India’s two largest online retailers who dominate the market, won’t be able to sell the products of companies in … [Read more...]

Retailers are working hard to blend the advanced logistics systems they have developed to compete with Amazon with their brick and mortar locations. One area of opportunity is better management of what's in stock on the shelves at each store. Now companies are deploying robots to take stock of inventory on store shelves and send that data back to warehouses in real time to make restocking more efficient. Jennifer Smith reports in The Wall Street Journal: The complicated blending of inventories in stores and warehouses has some retailers testing the use of shelf-scanning robots that roam store … [Read more...]

After a brutal 2018, the carnage in the retail industry continues into 2019. Today The Wall Street Journal reports that J.C. Penney could follow its long-time rival Sears into bankruptcy. Missteps by management and failed rejuvenation attempts have led J.C. Penney to the brink. Suzanne Kapner reports: J.C. Penney Co.’s JCP +0.00% sales are falling, its stores are stuck in malls and the turnaround strategy keeps changing. Now, three months after the embattled retailer hired a new chief executive, a handful of senior positions remain vacant. The series of events is prompting analysts and … [Read more...]