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Houston -- Francesca’s Holdings Corp. announced Monday that it has appointed Men’s Wearhouse CFO Neill Davis to its newly created position of president. Both companies are based in Houston. Davis, a 15-year executive of Men’s Wearhouse, has been a board member of the apparel and accessories chain for the past five years. He will officially become Francesca’s president on Aug. 6. Men's Wearhouse chief accounting officer and executive VP Diana Wilson will step in to the CFO role on an interim basis, said the company. VP finance and accounting Kelly Dilts will fill Wilson’s role of chief accounting officer.

Dick’s Sporting Goods isn’t the only rapidly growing sporting goods chain based in the Northeast. Lesser know Olympia Sports based in Westbrook, Maine, recently surpassed its 200th location and has begun a march south and west from its home state. The company plans to open 25 stores during its current fiscal year, including its first store in West Virginia and others in states south of New York. A similar pace of expansion is expected for the following fiscal year beginning in October. Most of Olympia’s 207 stores are located in the far Northeastern markets of Maine (29 stores), Massachusetts

Amazon.com reportedly agreed on Monday to buy mapping startup UpNext, the latest sign of increased competition between the world's largest internet retailer and tech rivals such as Google and Apple. GigaOM reported that UpNext Founders Raj Advani, Vik Advani, Robin Har and Danny Moon will move from New York to Seattle, where Amazon is based, to lead the e-commerce company's mapping efforts. The technology news service didn't report a purchase price, but said UpNext backers, including Chris Sacca's Lowercase Capital, will get a five-fold return on their investment, made about 16 months ago.

When J.C. Penney announced its radical no-sale "Fair and Square" pricing strategy at the beginning of the year, comp-store numbers started tumbling soon thereafter. The retailer announced earlier last month that it would backtrack on the plan a bit, having concluded (correctly) that consumers like the word "sale." Then its top marketer abruptly resigned. There's speculation that CEO Ron Johnson will have to cave and return to incessant couponing and sale events. I hope not.

Bon-Ton Stores has deployed the first round of more than 100 kiosks, which are equipped with endless aisle, loyalty program, wayfinding and product lookup applications. The chain first implemented kiosks throughout a few stores last summer during a piloting phase, and expect to expand the project to remaining retail stores as return on investment permits.

Golfsmith International Holdings, Inc. said revenues increased approximately 12 percent in the second quarter ended June 30, to $146.0 million as compared to net revenues of $130.2 million for the second quarter of fiscal 2011. Net revenues reflect a 4.7 percent increase in comparable store sales and a 4.8 percent decrease in net revenues from the direct-to-consumer channel. The sales decline in the direct-to-consumer business reflects a 27.1 percent decrease in our catalog business associated with the declines in the clubmaker catalog channel, partially offset by an 8.3 percent increase in the web channel. The company has opened 10

Despite rampant showrooming concerns, a new study finds smartphones "contributing to — not taking away from — in-store sales," with smartphone shoppers 14 percent more likely to convert and make a purchase in the store than nonsmartphone users. According to the Mobile Influence Factor study from Deloitte Consulting, through activities such as product research, price comparison and other mobile application use, smartphones currently influence 5.1 percent of annual retail store sales, translating into $159 billion in forecasted sales for 2012. 

According to a new study by Monetate, tablets may just be the future of e-commerce, more so than mobile or PCs, says Blair Lyon, vice president of marketing at Monetate. The study, which was released June 29, appeared in Monetate's Q1 E-Commerce Quarterly report. The study found that during the first quarter of last year, just 1.66 percent of all website visits came from tablets. During the second quarter of 2011, that percentage rose to 6.52 percent.

-- /PRNewswire/ -- Benihana Inc. (NASDAQ: BNHN) ("Benihana" or the "Company"), operator of the nation's largest chain of Japanese theme and sushi restaurants, today announced the expiration of the "go-shop" period pursuant to the terms of the previously announced Agreement and Plan of Merger by and among the Company, Safflower Holdings Corp. and Safflower Acquisition Corp., dated as of May 22, 2012 (the "Merger Agreement"), pursuant to which Safflower Acquisition Corp. will be merged with and into the Company, and as a result the Company will continue as the surviving corporation and a wholly-owned subsidiary of Safflower Holdings

Graduation season brings with it backyard parties and nostalgia, but it also comes with lots of interesting retail data. After comparing the shopping habits of more than 8 million people nationwide for the time periods before and during graduation season, RetailNext found that the nation as a whole declined roughly 5 percent in shopping for traditional gifting items during graduation.