Retail Stores

In this episode of Retail Right Now, Total Retail's Kristina Stidham and Melissa Campanelli discuss an article recently published by Total Retail, “What Mark Cuban’s Secret Shopper Experiment Can Teach Us About the Future of Retail.” This article was authored by Emily Lane, product evangelist at Retail Zipline, and shares findings from a study recently commissioned…

Los Angeles-based retailer Lucky Brand filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection on Friday, reports AP News. The apparel retailer blames its troubles in part on the coronavirus pandemic and said it plans to close 13 stores immediately, with more closures possible during the bankruptcy process. Lucky Brand said it has a deal lined up to…

As more and more states and cities inch toward a post-COVID existence, many considerations are falling on the shoulders of retailers. So much changed for people during quarantine, and how they shop is likely at the top of the list. Retailers, both online and brick-and-mortar, have to rethink their customer experience so that people are…

Nordstrom is the latest retail tenant to find itself at odds with its landlords. The upscale department store chain has reportedly notified the property owners of its namesake and off-price Rack stores that it will pay only half of its rent costs for the rest of 2020. A letter from President of Stores Jamie Nordstrom to…

Fast. Easy. Secure. Those are the words consumers use to describe their ideal checkout experience. But in reality, how often do those expectations ring true? Truthfully, not as often as retailers may think. Despite merchants’ best efforts to provide a smooth and seamless checkout, customers have reported that the in-store experience still isn’t always up…

If you tell your fleet of 100 stores to do something, less than a quarter of them will do it correctly, and on time. This isn’t a hunch: it’s a research-backed fact. Store execution has been retail’s Achillies heel for decades. So when Mark Cuban enlisted a third-party team of secret shoppers to assess how…

Microsoft said on Friday it will permanently close all of its 83 store locations and will instead focus on its e-commerce business, where customers can visit for support, sales, training and more. The decision comes after Microsoft temporarily closed stores in March due to the spread of the coronavirus. Microsoft said the thousands of workers from these stores have…

The 85-year-old vitamin and dietary supplement company GNC has announced it's filing for bankruptcy and closing up to a quarter of its stores, CNN reported. The retailer has nearly $1 billion in debt, and is looking for a buyer. GNC has faced declining sales at its brick-and-mortar locations since before the coronavirus pandemic. However, CNN…

Mall operator Brookfield Property Partners is suing Gap Inc. for refusing to open stores at the company’s properties in Texas and for owing more than $2 million in unpaid rent over three months, Bloomberg reported last week. “For three months running, Gap has failed to pay rent at virtually every Brookfield location nationwide, even for stores that Gap…

Dick’s Sporting Goods is expanding two new low-priced concepts. The sporting goods retailer first opened three clearance centers last year in Michigan, South Carolina and Wisconsin. But the 11 new stores — some called Overtime by Dick’s Sporting Goods, and others Dick’ Sporting Goods Warehouse — expand Dick's Sporting Goods off-price presence to nine states. Those include…