Top Retailers

DEERFIELD, Ill. — To honor and celebrate the service and commitment of the nation’s military heroes, Walgreens on Wednesday announced the offer of a discount to all veterans and active duty military in support of Veterans Day. On Sunday, Nov. 11, veterans will receive 15% off eligible store items and 20% off Walgreens and W Brand products with a valid military ID or proof of service at any Walgreens and Duane Reade drug store nationwide.

HOFFMAN ESTATES, Ill. — Kmart and Sears are offering free shipping for certain online orders as the holiday shopping season approaches.

Sears Holdings, the company that operates the two chains, said customers with orders of $49 or more from Kmart.com, Sears.com and MyGofer.com can receive free shipping. The company cited a recent "Sears Online Holiday Shopping Survey" that found most online shoppers listed shipping costs as their primary frustration with buying gifts online.

TORONTO — Target is supporting up-and-coming Canadian fashion designers through a partnership with the Toronto Fashion Incubator, the company said Tuesday.

Target announced the partnership with the incubator for the annual TFI New Labels fashion-design competition, the winner of which will receive a C$25,000 cash award and will get to have his or her exclusive collection sold in Target stores across Canada in 2014.

WOONSOCKET, R.I. — Coming off a strong third quarter, CVS Caremark executives expressed confidence that the company’s integrated retail/pharmacy benefit manager model and the unique programs and services it is able to deliver customers and clients are “making the difference,” president and CEO Larry Merlo told analysts during a Tuesday morning earnings call.

The opportunity for weight loss certainly hasn’t gone away — sales of diet-aid liquids were up 12.8% to $1.2 billion for the 52 weeks ended Sept. 9 across food, drug and mass (excluding Walmart), according to SymphonyIRI. And due to the temporary absence of GlaxoSmithKline’s Alli — unavailable because of a raw-ingredient sourcing issue — sales of diet-aid tablets are down with a 7% decline to a dollar base of 
$205.4 million. 
Alli had been removed from the market in March due to the third-party supply issue and returned in late June. 


The battle to capture and retain customers in a world where price, convenience and even customer service have become commoditized is in full swing. “The risk is you end up in a loyalty war [where] companies begin to use the loyalty scheme or the loyalty component of [the card] as another form of price escalation,” warned Bryon Pearson, president of LoyaltyOne and contributing editor to Colloquy, a magazine that has covered the loyalty marketing industry since 1990. “The intelligence that sits behind these programs is where the real value is,” he said.

Nielsen’s SVP consumer and shopper insights Todd Hale points to Kroger’s loyalty card as one of the best examples of consumer data aggregation. “Not only do you save money when you use their loyalty card, but you [also] save money no matter where you shop,” he said of Kroger’s 1-2-3 Rewards Visa Card, which is linked to its loyalty program.

That catapults actionable shopper data to an entirely new level — Kroger knows what its best customers are buying from other retailers.

WEST BRIDGEWATER, Mass. — Shaw's Supermarkets, a subsidiary of Supervalu, on Friday announced plans to reduce its store-level workforce by an estimated 700 positions. These reductions, which will occur across 169 Shaw's and Star Market stores in New England, and will be finalized by Nov. 3, the grocer stated.