COSTCO

PHOENIX — The Lily.B Skincare line has landed a second pilot launch in 20 Costco stores around the nation, the beauty company has announced.

In keeping with the Lily.B philosophy to “bring beauty to all the lives we touch,” Bishop is partnering with Toys for Tots and will donate $1 of every eye cream sold in Costco stores.

In addition, Lily.B was selected last week to be featured in the exclusive Country Music Awards' talent lounge. Founder Liz Bishop will be in Nashville, Tenn., for the CMA Awards from Nov. 7 to 9.

VANCOUVER, British Columbia — PNI Digital Media on Monday announced an agreement with Walgreens to provide and operate an online stationery service for the Chicago-based pharmacy.

The service will allow Walgreens customers to create and customize unique cards, invitations and other printed material, including personalized photobooks and photo calendars, wedding invitations and business cards.

According to reports, the PNI Digital Media Platform reaches more than 14,000 retail locations around the world, 9,000 of which offer a one-hour pickup service.

ISSAQUAH, Wash., and WESTBOROUGH, Mass. — Costco and BJ’s reported some impressive same-store sales for June, but peel the onion back a bit and the numbers are not quite as stellar as they seem.

YONKERS, N.Y. — Important safety information often is missing from drug labels, while some pharmacies don’t include medication guides required by the federal government, according to a new investigation by Consumer Reports.

BOSTON — There’s a tremendous upside for retailers and suppliers, but that upside will come from doing things differently than in years past, as well as grappling with fragmentation. Those were a few of the key messages Bryan Gildenberg, chief knowledge officer of Kantar Retail, had for attendees of Monday morning’s business session at NACDS Marketplace in Boston.

ALBANY, N.Y. — The cost of acquiring a Facebook “liker?" Less than 13 cents per fan, according to a Media Logic blog entry posted last week. At least that’s what retailer Kirkland's spent in its pursuit of more than 200,000 Facebook surfers who opted-in on the Kirkland's page. And because the act of a Facebook user “liking” a page is posted on that person’s newsfeed, it fast becomes a case of “if you tell two friends and they each in turn tell two friends ...”

ISSAQUAH, Wash. and WESTBOROUGH, Mass. — Costco Wholesale and BJ’s Wholesale reported strong sales growth and produced impressive comps even without the benefit of fuel sales.

Costco reported that net sales for the month of May increased 17% to $7.14 billion from $6.09 billion last year. This year’s May results period included sales from the company's Mexico joint venture. If these sales are excluded, Costco’s net sales increase would have been 14%.

ISSAQUAH, Wash. — Costco Wholesale EVP, CFO and director Richard Galanti told investors during the company’s third quarter 2011 earnings call last week that average prices in pharmacy probably would decline due to the introduction of generic versions of branded drugs.

“[The] only area where you are going to see some average price declines is probably in pharmacy where, and we've all read about it, there is some very well-known branded items that are going to become generic this coming year,” Galanti said.