ProSource added Dish Network as a vendor, giving members access to the satellite-TV service’s residential and commercial video offerings, plus Sling TV streaming, said the buying group Tuesday. ProSource members also will be able to participate in the Dish custom program, it said. The program gives integrators “the ability to easily create accounts for clients, provides access to skilled technicians for site surveys and complex installs, and includes a dedicated support hotline,” it said. Dish’s new revenue-sharing program also gives integrators a “recurring monthly revenue incentive” for each “qualifying” purchased account they sign on, it said. A harbinger of the new vendor agreement was when Dish attended the recent ProSource summit in Nashville (see 1903040043). The new ProSource arrangement comes after Dish reported its satellite subscriber losses in 2018 grew to 1.13 million from 995,000 a year earlier (see 1902130039).
Target posted its best full-year comparable sales growth, 5 percent, in more than a decade Tuesday, with Q4 comparable sales growth of 5.3 percent on a 4.5 percent rise in traffic. Comp store sales increased 2.9 percent; digital comps rose 31 percent, it said. Revenue for the quarter ending Feb. 2 was $22.98 billion vs. the $22.96 billion expected by analysts. Stores filled nearly three-quarters of the retailer’s Q4 digital sales, and the company reported market-share gains across its five core merchandise categories. It forecast low- to mid-single-digit comp sales increases for Q1 and full-year fiscal 2019. Shares closed 4.6 percent higher Tuesday at $76.
Walmart shares advanced 2.2 percent Tuesday to $102.20 after the company’s Q4 earnings report showed a 1.9 percent revenue increase to $138.8 billion from the year-earlier holiday quarter. In the U.S., its 43 percent bump in e-commerce sales fueled an overall 4.6 percent year-on-year revenue hike to $90.5 billion, while international sales fell 2.3 percent and Sam’s Club sales dropped 3.7 percent. Average tickets in the U.S. grew 3.3 percent for the quarter vs. 1 percent a year ago. Electronics, along with toys, home and seasonal merchandise, were Walmart U.S.’ strongest performers in Q4, said the company’s Tuesday earnings presentation, while Sam’s Clubs' technology/office/entertainment category saw negative single-digit comparable sales as an “intentional de-emphasis on events across consumer electronics were offset by mobile and gift cards that performed well.” Walmart’s traffic grew 0.9 percent in the quarter. Last week, the National Retail Federation reported U.S. holiday retail sales came in below forecast, growing 2.9 percent to $707.5 billion, while online and other non-store sales increased 11.5 percent to $146.8 billion (see 1902140019).
NPD will give the Census Bureau “regular data feeds” monthly on retail point-of-sale activity, relieving retailers of the “burden” of responding to agency data requests, said NPD Monday. The bureau relies on retailer reporting for “gauging the state” of the U.S. economy and consumer buying “behavior,” said NPD. Under a new data-sharing contract, “retailers can rely on NPD to seamlessly work with the Census Bureau directly.”
China is on track to become the world’s leading retail market this year, displacing the U.S., eMarketer reported Wednesday. China’s retail sales, led by Alibaba, will pass U.S. retail sales by more than $100 billion, growing 7.5 percent to $5.6 trillion in 2019. U.S. retail sales are projected to grow 3.3 percent to $5.5 trillion. Growth rates are slowing for both countries, but China’s growth rate will exceed that of the U.S. through 2022, it said. Rising incomes in China have created a new middle class, resulting in higher purchasing power and average spend per person, said analyst Monica Peart. Some 35 percent of China’s retail economy is e-commerce-based, with online sales expected to grow 30 percent this year to $1.99 trillion; in the U.S., e-commerce is forecast to be 11 percent of total retail sales. China’s leading e-tailers are Alibaba ($889 billion in 2018, $1.1 trillion forecast for 2019) and JD.com ($245 billion, $318 billion). Alibaba, with 58.2 percent market share last year, is expected to slip to 53.3 percent in 2019, losing share to newcomers and multichannel retailers, with JD.com remaining flat at 16 percent. By year-end, China will have 55.8 percent of global online retail sales, growing to 63 percent by 2022, while U.S. share of global e-commerce will drop from 17 percent this year to 15 percent.
ProSource announced 2019 members of the year to be honored at the buying group’s spring conference, slated for March 1-4 in Nashville. Regional winners are Audio Interiors, Northeast; First Priority Audio, Southeast; TriPhase Technologies, Midwest; DB Media Solutions, South Central; and AVD, West Coast.
Samsung is highlighting displays as interactive retail tools at the NRF 2019 retail expo this week in what it calls a “more efficient approach” to customer service. The company showed a “connected associate,” based on Samsung tablets and smartphones that store employees can use to deliver “the expertise of a seasoned specialist,” said the company. It demonstrated a ruggedized tablet with apps from Harman. A security demonstration combined Samsung’s Knox security platform with the BricTech app from Sennco, showing geofencing and custom triggers “bricking” stolen or misplaced devices. The system can also send alerts or sound alarms when devices are taken beyond specified perimeters, it said. The company launched at Harman’s New York store, Nexshop, a cloud-based analytics dashboard and real-time behavioral sensing technology that captures customer traffic data to target customers with content tailored to them. When a customer tries on a headset in front of a Nexshop-enabled mirror, display and camera sensor, the display launches customized content based on the customer’s demographic, said Samsung. The technology also detects customer traffic patterns through heat-map analysis and measures dwell time and footfall, allowing the store to allocate staffers based on customer behavior.
More than four in 10 U.S. consumers planned to shop at a dollar store this holiday season, reported NPD’s Checkout receipt-mining service. Dollar store chains like Dollar General, Dollar Tree and Family Dollar “are picking up in popularity,” buyers increasing 3 percent in the 12 months ended October, compared with the same period a year earlier, it said. “Dollar stores’ old bargain-based reputation is now more about value and variety, expanding their reach among consumers,” said NPD. “Especially during the holiday shopping season, time-starved consumers are attracted to one-stop retailers that help them minimize the surge in their spending.” Consumers of all income levels and age brackets are shopping at dollar stores, the researcher said. Nearly a third of dollar store spending comes from homes with incomes of $100,000 and higher, it said. Consumers between 45 and 54 years of age are the dollar stores’ sweet spot, with 30 percent of spending, the firm said: “However, younger consumers are also engaging with dollar stores.”
Over 600 Best Buy stores across the country will open at 12:01 a.m. EST Friday (Thursday at the respective times in Central, Mountain and Pacific time zones) to release Super Smash Bros. Ultimate for Nintendo Switch, said the retailer Thursday. Best Buy was offering a $10 reward certificate with preorders before release.
Los Angeles-based Video & Audio Center had a 37 percent sales bump Wednesday through Sunday, spokesman Tom Campbell told us, declining to give revenue figures for the privately held company. The five-store retailer took a different promotional tack this season, doing away with the typical $19 DVD doorbuster deal and focusing instead on attractive pricing on mid- to high-end 4K TVs. “There were no $99 TVs or $299 65-inch models,” Campbell said of the standard Black Friday deal featuring a second- or third-tier brand, saying VAC stores had Black Friday pricing on LG OLED, Samsung QLED and Sony Master Series models in sync with manufacturers’ pricing policies. VAC began accepting customer orders Wednesday for the Black Friday specials that officially began when doors opened on Thanksgiving at 4:30 p.m. to accommodate customers traveling for the weekend, Campbell said. Special 4K TV buys included a Sony 55-inch Android TV, half off to $598 (75 units); an LG 65-inch smart TV, $400 off to $596 (145 units); and a Samsung 82-inch model marked down $700 to $2,497 (75 units), said a store flyer. LG OLED TVs were up to $900 off. Meanwhile, Sonos was the first manufacturer featured in VAC’s gallery space that opened last month near its flagship store in the Westfield Century City mall (see 1810050042). The Sonos pop-up opened on Thanksgiving and will be open for a week staffed by Sonos sales specialists. Campbell wouldn’t disclose the next vendor up to occupy the space but said there's been “lots of manufacturer interest.”