Wal-Mart

It's almost Halloween, which means it's time for retailers to roll out their offensive Halloween costumes. This year, Wal-Mart's "Little Amigo," noticed by Complex, is kicking things off. It's everything you'd expect. The costume includes a serape shirt, sombrero and mustache that you can put on your probably-not-Hispanic kindergartner. The costume was taken off Wal-Mart's website…

Wal-Mart Stores’ technology arm, @WalmartLabs, on Tuesday said it's acquired Silicon Valley software company PunchTab, with intentions of using the company’s technology to tailor offers to its Sam’s Club shoppers. PunchTab marks WalmartLabs’ 15th acquisition in the last four years.

Wal-Mart has launched Wal-Mart Simple Text, a text messaging-based assistant for shopping at the retailer's stores. You simply text “hi” to 415-214-8445, thanks to Twilio, and you’re ready to ask Wal-Mart about the item(s) you’re interested in.

Wal-Mart said it would reopen in late October to early November five U.S. stores whose closure had prompted a union to file a complaint with the National Labor Relations Board, claiming the retailer was retaliating against workers for organizing. Wal-Mart will start hiring for the stores in Texas, Oklahoma, Florida and California, and will encourage previous…

Wal-Mart, in the midst of spending $1 billion to raise employees’ wages and give them extra training, has been cutting the number of hours some of them work in a bid to keep costs in check. Regional executives told store managers at the retailer’s annual holiday planning meeting last month to rein in expenses by cutting…

The calendar may still say summer, but retail giant Wal-Mart is encouraging consumers to get in the Christmas spirit now. With Labor Day more than a week away, the world's largest retailer is scheduled to launch its holiday season layaway plan four months before Dec. 25. Starting today, two weeks earlier than it did last season, Wal-Mart…

Wal-Mart said on Wednesday that it would no longer sell high-powered rifles in its stores in the United States. The decision followed years of public pressure on the retailer to stop selling some of the most lethal weapons associated with many of the nation’s mass shootings. The move predated the fatal shootings of two TV journalists…

One of the biggest problems Wal-Mart identified in its latest profit warning was what it calls “shrinkage.” Greg Foran, president and CEO for Wal-Mart U.S. said on the earnings call that “accelerating pressures in shrink” were one of three major factors that contributed to the company’s underperformance. The others were an overall decline in gross…

Sam’s Club wants to move beyond its parent’s DNA. The warehouse-club retailer, owned by Wal-Mart Stores Inc., for years has struggled to turn around sluggish sales. Now it's pursuing a more fundamental fix: breaking away from the low-income consumers who shop at Wal-Mart.

We find ourselves mid-year 2015 with the back-to-school shopping season upon us. The National Retail Federation reports that shoppers plan to spend about $630 overall on clothing, shoes, supplies and electronics for their K-12 students this year, a nearly 6 percent decline from the $669 average planned budget in 2014. Since the recession, consumers’ back-to-school…