Macy's

After getting women hooked on fancy handbags and expensive shoes in recent years, retailers are trying to rekindle a love affair with clothes. Department stores are leading the charge, with Saks, Nordstrom and Macy’s improving in-house clothing lines and refurbishing women’s departments.

Macy's will close five Macy's and four Bloomingdale's stores that are underperforming. More than 830 workers will be affected by the closings — 375 at Macy's stores and 463 at Bloomingdale's. But many could have the option of taking jobs at new stores the company plans to open.

Macy's, Wal-Mart and others continue to get high marks from Wall Street as the busy season draws to a close, while Sears proved that it's really not a jolly holiday for all stores. Wal-Mart's return to layaway helped the world's largest retailer and pressured others.

Macy's is the 2011 mobile marketer of the year, the highest accolade in mobile advertising, marketing and media. The honor tops the Mobile Marketer Awards handed out each year for outstanding work that moved the mobile needle for brands and marketers.

In response to feedback Retail Online Integration received yesterday regarding the reporting of this story, here's another take on the issue from the American Family Association.

Last week, a Macy's employee spotted a transgender woman going into the women's dressing room and decided to stop her and inform her that she wasn't really a woman. Macy's promptly fired the employee, but now she's has enlisted the help of a hatemongering conservative organization and is claiming that Macy's discriminated against her religious beliefs by denying her the right to harass whichever customer she chooses.

Italy-based fashion brand Etro recently opened its newly relocated London flagship store, according to www.wwd.com. Housed in a former art gallery on London's Bond Street, the two story, wood-paneled space spans 6,450 sq. ft. The new store is a cross between a grand aristocratic home and a luxe nomad’s tent, with oil portraits lining the walls, colored Venetian chandeliers in the changing rooms, and Art Deco furniture and light fixtures from the South of France. The store also features the building's original walnut paneling, marquetry and marble fireplaces, as well as skylights and a tiny cupola in the entranceway.

Most retailers are feeling quite merry after the start of the holiday shopping season drew a record number of visitors to their websites and stores. Shares of most major retailers soared in Monday trading, amid a broad market rally. The National Retail Federation estimates a record 226 million shoppers went to stores and websites during the four-day holiday weekend that started on Thanksgiving Day, up from 212 million last year. Each of them spent more this year too, shelling out $398.62 over the weekend, on average, compared with $365.34 a year ago. "Black Friday did not disappoint," Wedbush analyst

Retailers were hoping for more shoppers like Shawn Elzia as the annual Black Friday bargain stampede marked the unofficial start of what is widely expected to be a middling holiday shopping season. The Brooklyn, New York teacher, one of hundreds of thousands of shoppers jostling for deals around the country, said he ended up spending about 25 percent more than he planned, even while worrying about the state of the economy. "I did not expect such deals," the 33-year old said as he left a Macy's store in Jersey City, New Jersey clutching bags full of clothing for himself

Canton, Mass.-based Casual Male Retail Group Inc. has opened a new DestinationXL store in Carle Place, N.Y. The company plans to open up one more DXL store in 2011, another 20-30 stores during 2012 and approximately 100 stores over a four- to five-year period. In addition, the company recently launched a DXL website, DestinationXL.com, with a multichannel solution that enables customers to shop across all brands and product extensions. Currently, the company operates 428 Casual Male XL retail and outlet stores, 14 Rochester Clothing stores, 15 DestinationXL stores and direct-to-consumer businesses, which include several catalogs and e-commerce sites. SAVE