Hey Friends,
What a week it has been…..
To begin, Target has shoppers in a frenzy, lining up and causing mayhem for…a cup. As if it were a Black Friday sale, wishful consumers lined up, camped overnight, and tore through stores to get their hands on the Stanley x Starbucks collaboration tumbler. While the company has been around since 1913, 2023 saw a resurgence with sales in the fiscal year surpassing $750 million. The tumbler retails for $45, but secondary markets like StockX and eBay and seeing resells of $200+ for the particular collaboration.
Two of the largest technology and retail shows begin this week with the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) and the National Retail Federation’s Big Show which will feature the latest and greatest in consumer tech and set the stage for technology innovation for the year ahead.
Online retailer Zulily is shutting down. The company announced on its website it has made the "difficult but necessary decision to conduct an orderly wind-down of the business." This news comes just after 7 months of new leadership. Zulily’s assets will be liquidated over the next 12 to 18 months. The Seattle based retailer was founded in 2010 and faced extreme headwinds when competing with other Amazon and other e-commerce providers.
At the Consumer Electronics Show, Walmart previewed examples of what their store of the future could look like. The highlights include a new GenAI-powered search experience for iOS users, allowing specific use-case searches with cross-category results. Walmart also previewed InHome Replenishment, an AI-driven system leveraging decades of replenishment expertise to ensure timely delivery of the right items directly into customers' refrigerators. Additionally, the beta social commerce platform, Shop with Friends, enhances AR shopping by enabling users to share and receive feedback on virtual outfits they create with friends. A deeper recap can be seen here.
Walmart is advancing its commitment to providing customers with maximum convenience by extending drone delivery services to an additional 1.8 million households in the Dallas Fort-Worth metroplex. This expansion covers 75% of the area and aims to deliver items within 30 minutes. Sam’s Club also unveiled a new technology that aims to solve a key concern for its members – waiting in line for receipt verification when exiting the club. The technology uses AI and computer vision technology to deliver new levels of convenience as members exit their club.
Two large Pizza Hut operators in California are laying off all their delivery drivers ahead of a new state law that raises the minimum wage for fast-food workers to $20 an hour, Business Insider reports. The layoffs impact hundreds of Pizza Hut locations across the state including Los Angeles, Orange, Riverside, Ventura and San Bernardino counties and Sacramento, and involve more than 1,200 in-house delivery drivers.
Nedap has been making waves in the retail front this week with partnerships extending to PacSun and On Running. Pacsun has chosen Nedap’s iD Cloud solution to increase inventory accuracy, inform replenishment decisions, and improve both omnichannel and in-store experiences. RFID will immediately begin delivering value as stores create a higher level of transparency with orders and fulfillment. Deployment of iD Cloud Store to all of Pacsun’s stores are estimated to complete in Q1 2024. On is to deploy the iD Cloud platform in factories, warehouses, distributors and stores worldwide. This way, On can track and trace every single item from source to consumer. This leads to improved operations in warehouses and stores and protects products from being sold in unauthorized markets.
A more in-depth review of the Consumer Electronic Show will be covered in future iterations.
The S&P Retail Select Industry Index rose 20% this year, however one retail stock has been the clear winner this year as fashion trends revisited the late 90s and early 2000s. Abercrombie & Fitch Co. has gained 285% this year, its best annual performance since going public in 1996. Abercrombie was the top performer in the S&P 1500 Index, even managing to beat out artificial intelligence leading Nvidia at 239% gain.
Amazon announces addition of Buy with Prime through new partnership with Salesforce Commerce Cloud. This partnership will allow retailers using the Salesforce platform to seamlessly integrate Buy with Prime into their existing e-commerce experience. Invitation-only rollouts begin mid January with full availability later in 2024.
Amazon has shuttered the last of its two Fresh Pickup facilities in Seattle. Dubbed “a new model of grocery shopping,” Fresh Pickup launched in 2017. Amazon opened two facilities in Seattle — one in Sodo and the other in Ballard. The facilities served as a dedicated drive-up grocery pickup service for Amazon Prime members, as well as a drop-off spot for package returns.
Rent the Runway is laying off 10% of its corporate employees as part of a new restructuring plan. Chief Operating Officer and President, Anushka Salinas, will also leave at the end of the month, after 11 years at the company. Jennifer Hyman, Rent the Runway’s cofounder, CEO, and chair of the board, says this is all designed to help the company break even and achieve profitability.
And to finish with what felt like the biggest surprise of the week….Tiger Woods announced Monday that his longtime partnership with Nike has ended after 27 years, closing one of the most iconic brand relationships in professional sports history. According to Forbes, while an exact number is difficult, it’s safe to say he’s earned roughly $500 million through his contacts over the span of the partnership. Woods’ is often credited for revolutionizing modern golf, leaving in question Nike’s future in the sport. In some additional Nike news, Nike announced it would cut up to $2 billion in costs over the next three years to “fuel future growth, accelerate innovation and speed and scale and drive greater long-term profitability.” Among other areas, Nike will aim to simplify its product assortment, increase its use of automation and streamline the organization.