Management

After last week's rumblings that Marc Jacobs would discontinue its freestanding secondary line, folding it into the overall brand, the designer himself has confirmed the plan to Women's Wear Daily. According to Jacobs, the decision to intermingle the two reflects the increasingly high-low scope of fashion today. "The intention now is no different than when Robert [Duffy] and I started Marc by Marc Jacobs or Marc-no-Jacobs," he said. (The latter was what the two jokingly called the label at the outset.) 

Weighed down by millions in debt and poor business ventures, the Boston streetwear company Karmaloop Inc. filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy Monday. Meanwhile, rapper Kanye West and hip-hop entrepreneur Dame Dash expressed interest in buying a majority stake of the 15-year-0ld company, said Greg Selkoe, founder and chief executive of Karmaloop.

Lumber Liquidators said Thursday that it stands by its products and will pay for the safety testing of laminate floors for customers to help ease concerns. The Toano, Va.-based company addressed concerns raised following a "60 Minutes" report that said the company's laminate flooring made in China contained high levels of formaldehyde, a carcinogen. The report earlier this month said the company's laminate flooring fell short of California's standards, something it denies. Lumber Liquidators has said that it complies with all regulations for its products.

With shallow pockets but a deep commitment to promote "living wages," women's advocacy group UltraViolet has peppered Target with cheap location-focused online ads, challenging it to match Wal-Mart's promise of $10-an-hour base pay. The nonprofit advocacy group launched its campaign on Tuesday. With a budget of just $5,000, it purchased online ads that appear on the browsers of people surfing the web within an approximately 1,000-feet radius of three stores in Minnesota, Pennsylvania and Nebraska.

Target cut 1,700 people at its corporate offices in the Twin Cities on Tuesday, the largest downsizing of its headquarters staff ever. The retailer's top managers had set the company's employees on edge a week before by announcing plans to cut "several thousand" corporate jobs. On Tuesday, they lost no time in implementing their plan, with workers cut loose en masse.

A little more than a month after filing for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection, specialty women's apparel retailer Cache is throwing in the towel. Advisory and valuation services provider Great American Group, which won a bid for Cache's assets at a March 3 bankruptcy auction, has begun "going out of business" sales for all Cache's retail locations in the U.S., the Virgin Islands and Puerto Rico. The sale will offer significant discounts on the retailer's inventory of women's apparel and accessories. Select furniture, fixtures and equipment at stores, warehouses and corporate offices will also be for sale.

Scott Jordan wants to save the in-flight catalog SkyMall, but right now the airlines aren't returning his calls, he told CNBC on Monday. SkyMall filed for bankruptcy protection earlier this year and Jordan, CEO of ScotteVest, plans to bid for its assets during an auction later this month. "SkyMall's value is entirely dependent, in my opinion, upon deals with all the airlines and unfortunately most if not all the airline contracts with SkyMall have expired or are up for renewal/renegotiation," he said in an interview with "Closing Bell."

If the ability to throw a 100-mile-per-hour fastball sits at one end of the human capital spectrum, stocking shelves and swiping barcodes is at the opposite. But the U.S. economy gets on quite nicely with just a few dozen ace pitchers, while it takes vast stadiums of cashiers — and no small amount of investment in human capital — to keep things humming. A modest bidding war has broken out among the retailers that hire from the bottom of the labor pool, buoyed in part by improving sales. 

Online retailer Etsy, known for its handmade crafts, filed documents on Wednesday confirming plans by the Brooklyn-based company to go public. Etsy didn't say how many shares it intends to sell in the offering, but said it seeks to raise at least $100 million worth selling its stock, which will then trade under the ticker symbol "ETSY." The offering is being handled by Goldman Sachs, Morgan Stanley and boutique investment bank Allen & Company, according to Etsy's filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission.

Target plans to invest billions of dollars this year streamlining operations, opening more small stores and creating a product mix designed to appeal to a younger, broader consumer demographic. The retailer will also cut several thousand jobs in the next two years as part of a cost-savings plan, Target managers said at a meeting Tuesday with financial analysts and investors. The company didn't say how many of its employees will be cut, although most are expected to be at the company's Minneapolis base, where it employs 13,000.