Year: 2019

WH Smith acquires Marshall Retail Group

WH Smith investors have voted in favour of the group’s acquisition of US retailer Marshall Retail Group. In a general meeting held yesterday (18 December), 99.98% of shareholders voted to acquire the group in a $400m ( £312m) deal on a cash and debt-free basis. The approved move will now…

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The impact of menswear in the retail sector – what to Know

The world of retail is ever-transforming and ever-evolving. From the experience-first stores to emerging technologies such as smart displays and self-checkouts, one can say that the shopping experience has now been taken to the next level. However, there’s one facet in the retail evolution that’s quite apparent these days, which…

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Returns and fraud – two key issues for e-commerce in 2020

While returns continue to be a fact of life for retailers for a number of reasons, one area they can control is in having accurate customer address data. This will play a key role in reducing the frequency of ‘return to sender’ scenarios. The issue today is the reliance by…

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Vera Lynn’s gin dispute is a window on a fascinating trademark problem

Everyone knows a bit of cockney rhyming slang, but what if your own name is the one being used, and then somebody tries to use it as their brand? This is exactly what happened to the singer Dame Vera Lynn, who has just been awarded £1,800 in legal costs from…

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400 jobs at risk as The Book People enters administration

The Book People has entered into administration, putting 400 jobs at risk. Toby Underwood and Zelf Hussain, of PWC, have now been appointed as joint administrators of the bookseller. According to PWC, the administration is a result of the “difficult” trading environment that the business has been experiencing, combined with…

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97% of staff are against Boxing Day trading, says Usdaw

An overwhelming majority of shop staff are opposed to Boxing Day trading, according to a new survey from workers union Usdaw. A survey of over 12,000 shopworkers, 85% of them in retail, found that 97% think that shops should be closed the day after Christmas to allow them to spend…

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Online sales soar in November

Online sales grew 16.4% year-on-year in the month of November, according to the latest figures from the IMRG Capgemini Online Retail Index. The index, which tracks the performance of some 200 retailers, recorded the largest monthly growth since April 2018. This figure significantly surpassed the three month, six month and…

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Pandora appoints former Bulgari exec as new CMO

Jewellery brand Pandora has appointed former vice president of global marketing and communication, Carla Liuni, as its new chief marketing officer. Liuni is set to join the business in March and will report to CEO Alexander Lacik and will be serving on Pandora’s executive leadership team. Prior to joining Pandora,…

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‘Jingle bots’ are artificially ramming online shopping baskets to use up stock

I have my reservations about this story because we spend a lot of time in our office poring over the news for interesting stories and takes, and we haven’t seen it reported like this before. But it comes from a company called Radware, which is a publicly traded web app…

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H&M sales rise in Q4

Fashion retailer H&M has reported a 9% increase in net sales to SEK61,704m (£4.98m) for the three months to 30 November 2019. Despite the sales growth, H&M said sales development for the quarter compared with the previous year was affected by Black Friday falling at the end of November. H&M…

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