Target CEO announces leadership promotions by Nick Halter at Minn./St. Paul Business Journal. “Omnichannel president and senior vice president Casey Carl moved into the leadership team, reporting to Cornell as chief strategy and innovation officer. Jason Goldberger has been named president of Target.com and mobile. Chief Marketing Officer Jeff Jones will take on added responsibilities, including enhancing the guest experience through a new “guest center of excellence” Read more

 

Retail watchers say Nook would be a good fit for Wal-Mart by Kim Souza at The City Wire. “You need go no further than Wal-Mart’s own book section on their website to understand their motivation for acquiring Nook. Prominently featured at the top of the page is a banner ad for “Great Gifts” promoted by the “Hatchette Book Group.” Read more

 

Target Teams With Improv Everywhere For Elaborate Christmas Carol Stunt by Steve Hall at Marketing Land. “This week, Improv Everywhere teamed with Target for some unconventional marketing and to orchestrate an elaborate Christmas Carol stunt involving five surprised families. Unlike many of Improv Everywhere’s flashmob-style stunts, the Target stunt involved elaborate planning, a large crew and five willing mothers.” Read more

 

The “Save Big Money at Menards” Jingle: A History by Chaz Kangas at City Pages. “While the popular feel-good urban legend is that the jingle’s music and lyrics were created by John Menard Jr.’s wife as something of a home improvement theme-music Betsy Ross, most accounts attribute the song’s origins to studio musicians and the competitive nature of the jingle era.” Read more / See the old video

 

Michelle Obama: I Was Asked to Take Something Off a Shelf at Target by Daniel Halper at The Weekly Standard. “The Obamas talked with People magazine about dealing with their “own racist experiences,” as the magazine described…Michelle Obama told one story that recently took place…”I tell this story – I mean, even as the first lady – during that wonderfully publicized trip I took to Target, not highly disguised, the only person who came up to me in the store was a woman who asked me to help her take something off a shelf. Because she didn’t see me as the first lady, she saw me as someone who could help her. Those kinds of things happen in life. So it isn’t anything new,” Michelle Obama, who is 5’11”, said.” Read more 

 

NY Times: Amazon Not as Unstoppable as It Might Appear by Farhad Manjoo. “The key to its vulnerability is the smartphone, a device whose scope and significance Jeff Bezos, the chief executive, has not yet managed to corral. Phones have already radically altered both the way Americans shop and how retail goods move about the economy, but the transformation is just beginning — and it is far from guaranteed that Amazon will emerge victorious from the transition.” Read more

 

Hudson’s Bay taps former Target Exec as new CEO by Hollie Shaw at Financial Post. “(Gerald) Storch, 58, was chairman and CEO of Toys R Us from 2006 to early 2013…Prior to that, he held varying executive roles at Target between 1993 and 2005, and was in charge of the retailer’s SuperTarget grocery strategy, its credit card business and the rollout of its web division, Target.com.” Read more

 

America’s holiday spend: $1000-plus per person by Rebecca Shabad at The Hill. “Just under a third said they usually regret how much they spend during the holidays.” Read more

 

Fox News anchor Shep Smith Worries We’ll Ruin Cuba with Taco Bell and Lowe’s by Andrew Kirell at Mediaite. “You know the fear among anybody who’s ever been there or who cares at all about the Cuban people, as so many of us do,” Smith continued, “the last thing they need is a Taco Bell or a Lowe’s.” Read more

 

Market Basket film, funded by fans, will retell the saga by Callum Borchers at Boston Globe. “Jay Childs, who spent much of July and August filming on the picket lines, has launched an online fund-raising campaign through Kickstarter that aims to collect $50,000 for editing and post-production costs of a project he calls “Food Fight: Inside the Battle for Market Basket.” In five days, he’s pulled in about $13,000, mostly from donations of $75 or less.” Read more

 

“You Know It’s Bad in Russia When They Start Hoarding the Buckwheat” at Bloomberg. “Volkova said that when she was in her hometown of St. Petersburg last week, shelves in some electronics and home-goods retailers had been cleaned out.” Read more

 

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