Management

Sears announced that Raj Penkar will be joining the company on Sept. 15 as senior vice president and president, supply chain. Penkar will be accountable for all aspects of the company's supply chain, including logistics, warehousing, inventory management and distribution.

While current economic conditions leave most businesses reluctant to hire new employees, Party City deviates from the national unemployment trend and prepares for an intense hiring wave. In anticipation for the Halloween season, a nearly $6 billion industry and the second largest retail holiday according to the National Retail Federation, Party City is recruiting more than 14,000 employees in communities across the country.

Talbots took a series of steps, including firing its creative head, to fix its long-running merchandise problems, sending the women's clothes retailer's shares up as much as 12 percent. The company, whose sales have fallen steadily for the past five years, fired Chief Creative Officer Michael Smaldone to "bring in new creative leadership."

A former Borders employee is attempting to represent a class of about 300 workers in suing the bankrupt retailer for not giving proper notice of impending mass layoffs.

Retail has always been an industry with a high level of customer interaction; providing a satisfying shopping experience is integral to sales. And it's no different for e-commerce, particularly as consumers remain cautious and need incentives to spend.

If your business is suffering from low workforce motivation, consider adding an incentive program. According to survey results from Staples Advantage, incentive programs which reward employees for meeting performance-based milestones, can help bolster performance and morale.

Shop.org announced the addition of six members to its board of directors and welcomed back three incumbents. The new and returning board members will meet for the first time as a group later this month at Shop.org's Annual Summit in Boston. Each newly-elected member will serve a two-year term. Shop.org is the digital division of the National Retail Federation, the world's largest retail trade group.

Blockbuster Canada, which once operated nearly 400 stores, will close its remaining 253 stores as its bankruptcy receiver seeks to wind down the chain's operations in the country.

Hot Topic announced that two new executives have joined the company, Don Hendricks as CIO and Jeff Allison as senior vice president of planning and allocation. Hendricks will lead all information technology for Hot Topic and Allison will lead the merchandise planning and allocation teams for both the Hot Topic and Torrid brands.

For the last 25 years, Dennis May has been involved in the retail industry — and he's loved every second of it. From his modest beginning selling audio equipment to help support himself while in college (that was the cool job at the time, May recalls) to his tenure today as president and CEO of one of the fastest-growing cross-channel retail brands out there, the one constant has been retail. But that's just part of the reason we've chosen May as our 2011 cross-channel retailer of the year.