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TORONTO, Ontario (BRAIN)Norco has expanded its partnership store program to Canadas east coast with the opening of Cyclepath Yonge and Eglinton in central Toronto. The store will highlight Norco bicycles, as well as its proprietary brands Axiom and Adams Trail-A-Bike and many of the brands distributed by Norco, Canadas largest bike supplier and distributor. Norco opened its first partnership store over the summer in British Columbia. Norcos partnership program requires at least 75 percent of retail space be devoted to brands in Norcos range of 160 bikes and 25,000 SKUs in its distributor catalog. This alliance represents a step

Brown Shoe Company said its third-quarter profit jumped sharply as the sale of a business unit offset soft sales. The shoe company also said it will continue to trim its business to improve its profitability, announcing plans to exit several business lines and close stores nationwide.

comScore today reported holiday season retail e-commerce spending for the first 20 days of the November and December 2011 holiday season. To date, $9.7 billion has been spent online, marking a 14 percent increase compared to the corresponding days last year.

Kmart has been forced to withdraw a line of underwear for young girls that carries slogans such as "call me" and "I ♥ rich boys" after the store was accused of sexualizing teenagers. Kmart has confirmed that it will remove the underwear, which is part of its popular Girl Xpress range, after it was the target of a Twitter campaign led by outraged parents, who described the slogans as "disgusting" and "sleazy."

A coalition of retail groups sued the Federal Reserve on Nov. 22, claiming the regulator ignored the law by setting too high a cap on the fees that banks can charge merchants for handling debit card purchases. 

St. Louis-based Brown Shoe Co. Inc. recently announced plans to shutter a total of 145 Famous Footwear stores.

Online luxury clothing retailer Gilt Groupe plans to launch an initial public offering late next year or possibly in 2013, the company's chief executive told the Financial Times. "I think it's entirely possible that in 2013, depending on the markets and depending on how things are going, that we would look to go public," Chief Executive Kevin Ryan was quoted as saying.

Canton, Mass.-based Casual Male Retail Group Inc. has opened a new DestinationXL store in Carle Place, N.Y. The company plans to open up one more DXL store in 2011, another 20-30 stores during 2012 and approximately 100 stores over a four- to five-year period. In addition, the company recently launched a DXL website, DestinationXL.com, with a multichannel solution that enables customers to shop across all brands and product extensions. Currently, the company operates 428 Casual Male XL retail and outlet stores, 14 Rochester Clothing stores, 15 DestinationXL stores and direct-to-consumer businesses, which include several catalogs and e-commerce sites. SAVE

Luxury specialty retailer Barneys New York opened its holiday display, Gaga's Workshop, and unveiled its holiday windows. Lady Gaga, creative director Nicola Formichetti, artist Eli Sudbrack and Christophe Hamaide Pierson of avaf created the non-traditional holiday display. The display includes a retail environment, holiday windows, a dedicated Gaga interactive website and limited edition, exclusive products created in collaboration with Lady Gaga. There are eight stations in Gaga's Workshop reflecting the product categories available for sale including: candy shop, toy shop, closet (for apparel and accessories), library (for books, CDs, media, and paper goods), gallery (for collectibles and specialty items),

1-800-Flowers.com announced the signing of a 45-store franchise development agreement for its Fannie May Fine Chocolates division with GB Chocolates. The agreement calls for 45 new Fannie May franchise stores beginning in December 2011, with all open and operating by year-end 2014.