Management

Women's apparel retailer Coldwater Creek could file for bankruptcy within a week as it struggles with high debt and declining sales, The Wall Street Journal reported, citing people familiar with the matter. Attempts to avoid a bankruptcy filing by refinancing debt or selling itself to a private-equity buyer were unsuccessful, the sources told the Journal. Coldwater Creek wasn't immediately available for comment. Sales fell 18 percent to $154.5 million in the third quarter ended Nov. 2, while same-store sales declined 16.8 percent.

Rebekka Bay, the creative director of Gap, has strict rules about how to design a collection. She also has rules for how to break the rules. "Fashion is also about instinct and gut reaction," she says. "So if I suddenly wake up in the middle of the night and think, 'The shirt has to be frilly,' and that's what we really want, then I'm going to say, 'Of course it has to be frilly.' " The frilly shirt will be in 

The Container Store is marking Valentine's Day with the launch of its Employee First Fund — an employee assistance fund that will provide grants to employees experiencing unforeseen emergencies, major medical situations, catastrophic events or other challenges in life that they're not financially prepared to handle. The Container Store is contributing $100,000 to kick off the fund, and after that, employees and other stakeholders have the opportunity to make donations. The fund is part of the retailer's annual National We Love Our Employees Day, a day it created five years ago.

On Sunday, RadioShack used comedy, in the form of a Super Bowl ad, to show its stores being dismantled and rebuilt. On Tuesday, the news broke that some of the stores will be dismantled, period. According to people familiar with the matter, RadioShack is planning to close around 500 locations in the coming months. It isn't clear which of RadioShack's roughly 4,300 stores will be closed and when exactly the closings will begin. The people familiar with the matter noted that it isn't unusual for companies to close stores when going through a restructuring. 

Amazon.com will not, it turns out, be getting its first labor union ever in the U.S. On Wednesday night, a majority of a group of 27 technicians at an Amazon fulfillment center in Middletown, Del., voted to reject an initiative to form a union under the auspices of the International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers, according to John Carr, a spokesman for the IAMAW. The vote was 21 to 6. "That number is a clear reflection that the tactics Amazon and its law firm employed were very effective," Carr said. 

Federal officials have filed a formal complaint charging that Wal-Mart violated the rights of protesting and striking workers last year. The National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) says Wal-Mart illegally fired, disciplined or threatened more than 60 employees in 14 states for participating in legally protected activities to complain about wages and working conditions. The labor board's general counsel first laid out the charges last November, but held off on filing a complaint while trying to work out a settlement with Wal-Mart. 

In the same breath as it announced a "successful" holiday season, Macy's said it would lay off some 2,500 employees as it attempts to achieve $100 million in savings a year. In addition to the workers losing their jobs, some associates will be reassigned or transferred, the retailer said. Not all open positions will be filled. Among the positions targeted: district merchandise planners for Macy's soft home categories, whose responsibilities will be handed off to regional and national organizers. Macy's said it plans to trim central office, administration and back-of-house expenses. 

"Uneasy lies the head that wears a crown." The oft misquoted line from Shakespeare's "Henry IV" can easily be applied to the life of a retail CEO. When the brand is doing well the CEO is on top of the world and lavished with praise, but as soon as sales start to slide and stock prices dip, his/her head is on the chopping block. The following is a list of the best and worst retail CEOs for 2013: 

Jeff Bezos, the founder of Amazon.com and new owner of The Washington Post, suffered a kidney stone attack while celebrating the New Year in the Galapagos Islands and had to be rushed back to the U.S. On New Year's Day, an Ecuadorian navy helicopter flew Bezos from Academy Bay in Santa Cruz Island, where he was aboard a cruise ship, to his private jet on Baltra Island. He was then taken to the U.S. for emergency treatment, according to a summary of local newspaper reports by the Galapagos Digital website.

Warby Parker started with a casual conversation among friends. Four Wharton MBA students were hanging out one morning on campus, and one of them, Dave Gilboa, happened to mention how annoyed he was with the high price of eyeglasses. They talked over the problem a bit, wondering if glasses might somehow work as an online business. "I remember going home and just constantly thinking about this idea, having trouble going to sleep that night," recalls Neil Blumenthal, who, along