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For top U.S. retailers, free delivery is now the norm. That is good news for shoppers, but not so much for investors. During the just-ended holiday season, outlets from Target to Wal-Mart to Amazon expanded their free-delivery options, adding more items eligible for free shipping. They also did away with minimum spending thresholds to qualify for the perk. Yet as

2014 was a transitional period for the retail industry. It was the year when mobile and online sales exploded, and retailers worked harder than ever to fuse their physical and digital stores. It was peppered with a number of high-profile CEO exits, including American Apparel's controversial Dov Charney and

With $1 billion in costs to cut as part of its merger with Alliance Boots, Walgreen Co. is preparing for potential store design changes and new retail locations to reduce expenses and boost under-performing operations. The largest drugstore chain in the U.S. earlier this week hinted at

Amazon and other retailers are on pace to sell more products online than ever this holiday season, aided by early promotions and investments in delivery systems that helped avoid the widespread shipping delays of last year. Web sales rose 14 percent from Nov. 27 to Dec. 21, consulting firm ChannelAdvisor Corp. said in a statement earlier this week.

Say what you will about regifting. Like it or not, it's entirely possible a present you received this year is destined for the regift pile-or eBay -because exchanging it for cash, or even store credit, isn't an

The U.S. Department of Labor is investigating how RadioShack manages its retirement plan for employees, according to a regulatory filing. The electronics retailer received a letter from the

Minimum wage increases across the United States will prompt Wal-Mart Stores to adjust base salaries at 1,434 stores, impacting about a third of its U.S. locations, according to an internal memo reviewed by Reuters. The memo, which was sent to store managers earlier this month, offers insight into the impact of minimum wage hikes in 21 states due to come into effect on or around Jan. 1, 2015.

With all the talk of Amazon.com crushing brick-and-mortar chains, can the online giant, or any pure-play e-commerce merchant, ever really compete with physical stores when it comes to the instant gratification of leaving a store with a purchase in hand? Amazon's launch last week of Prime Now, a speedy delivery service on tens of thousands of daily essentials to parts of New York City, revived that question.

Sorry, last-minute holiday shoppers. United Parcel Service and FedEx started capping air express deliveries in recent days after an 11th-hour increase in packages caused some retailers to exceed agreed-upon limits, according to people briefed on the situation. This year, both UPS and FedEx held some retailers to their volume commitments during the final shopping days before Christmas, aiming to avoid a repeat of last year's fiasco. Last Christmas, an estimated 2 million express packages didn't arrive under the tree in time, according to software tracking developer Shipmatrix Inc.

Chinese e-commerce giant Alibaba took 90 million counterfeit items offline and spent over 1 billion yuan ($160.7 million) fighting fake goods, from the beginning of 2013 to November this year. The online company's announcement highlights its massive issue with so-called "knock-offs" and its efforts to clean up its act ahead of the company's record $25 billion initial public offering (IPO) in September.