Mergers & Acquisitions

eBags has agreed to be acquired by Samsonite International, the travel luggage maker that once employed most of eBags’ co-founders. Samsonite, which started in Denver and is now based in Hong Kong and Luxembourg, said it would pay $105 million for the Denver-based e-tailer of purses, suitcases and nearly any bag imaginable. The deal is…

Office supplies retailer Staples is in preliminary talks with a number of private equity firms for a potential sale. Reports say Staples started to look for buyers after its much anticipated merger with Office Depot fell through. Both companies faced heavy regulatory resistance over the proposed merger, which culminated in a federal judge blocking the deal. In…

Dollar General confirmed its plans on Monday to buy all 323 stores in 36 states from Dollar Express, the chain of former Family Dollar stores owned since late 2015 by the private equity firm Sycamore Partners. The Charlotte Observer reports that up to 2,700 part-time and full-time store employees of Dollar Express may be losing their…

Fanatics, which sells officially licensed sports merchandise and operates more than 300 online and offline stores, including the e-commerce businesses for Major League Baseball, NFL, NASCAR and many other professional sports leagues, has acquired Majestic, a VF Corporation brand that has become synonymous with the production of MLB uniforms. The transaction is expected to close in…

Last week, Amazon.com announced that it's shutting down its Quidsi subsidiary because it isn’t able to turn a profit. However, some employees believe there are alternative reasons for Quidsi's closure. In a meeting in late 2016, Amazon and Quidsi execs told employees they were confident that Quidsi would turn a profit and generate significant cash…

Scott Friend, managing director for Bain Capital Ventures, interviewed Jet.com's Marc Lore at Shoptalk in Las Vegas last month. In this video, Total Retail's Joe Keenan caught up with Friend to get his take on the year's top retail trends, technologies and what brands should do to survive the current retail tides.

Gander Mountain has agreed to a stalking horse bid for its assets as it looks to remain in business. A joint venture comprising Boston-based investment firm Gordon Brothers and retail specialist Hilco Merchant Resources made the bid, which was filed in U.S. Bankruptcy Court. A stalking horse bid sets the bar for a sale, but…

Houston-based Stage Stores announced yesterday it won a bid to acquire about half of Gordmans Stores Inc.’s assets through a bankruptcy auction. Under the terms of the deal, a subsidiary of Stage Stores plans to acquire between 50 and 57 Gordmans store leases, including all of the inventory, furniture, fixtures, equipment and other assets at those…

Amazon.com announced Wednesday that it's shuttering Quidsi, the company behind Diapers.com, because it was unprofitable. Amazon acquired Quidsi in late 2010 after it skyrocketed to popularity by shipping diapers and other household products mostly free of shipping costs. The acquisition cost Amazon $500 million. Quidsi was co-founded by Marc Lore, who stayed with Amazon three years…

According to sources inside both companies, Coach’s acquisition of Kate Spade may be announced in a matter of weeks, if not days. The price of acquisition is not yet known, although analysts suggest it could be north of $2 billion. In a March 2017 report, Cowen & Company said that there was an 80 percent chance…