LG Electronics joined Azione Unlimited as a member and vendor partner for 2015, the buying group said Tuesday.
With shipping cutoff dates approaching next week, Walmart offered free shipping with no minimum for the day Thursday. Walmart’s holiday shipping rates for the holiday season had been free “value" shipping with a $49 purchase minimum. The “value” cutoff shipping dates at Walmart are Dec. 15-17 for six-eight-day delivery, with times determined by shipping location. Dec. 19 is the cutoff for standard shipping orders for $4.97 on items above $49 and $6.97 for items below $49. Fees vary for expedited shipping, which cuts off on Dec. 21, and for rush shipping, which ends Dec. 22. Customers can pick up items purchased online in stores through Dec. 23, the retailer said, and stores will be open on Dec. 24. The free shipping offer doesn’t apply to photo, pharmacy, gift cards, tires or freight items, it said.
Amazon is continuing its price-cutting attack with its Fire franchise as the holiday season officially kicks in. After enticing Prime customers with a $19 deal for the $39 Fire TV Stick, it whacked the investment in a Fire Phone to $199 unlocked, after launching it in June for $649 unlocked, or $199 with a two-year AT&T contract. In the Kindle line, Amazon is offering a limited-time deal on the 6-inch e-reader, cutting the price from $139 to $99, including six months of “unlimited reading.” Amazon’s vault of Amazon Unlimited content -- 700,000 books and audio books -- is available to members for $9.99 per month.
Best Buy closed one store in the St. Louis area early Monday ahead of the 8 p.m. CST announcement of the St. Louis County grand jury decision exonerating Ferguson, Missouri, police officer Darren Wilson in the shooting of Michael Brown, a Best Buy spokesman emailed us Tuesday. All Best Buy stores in the area were open normally on Tuesday morning, he said. A store associate at the Best Buy in Brentwood, the location that closed early on Monday, told us that plans called for regular store hours and a 9 p.m. closing time Tuesday night “as far as anyone has told us.” The company is “monitoring the situation closely and will make adjustments when necessary to ensure the safety of our employees and customers,” the spokesman said. “Because of the developing nature of the situation, we aren’t going to speculate on what may or may not happen later in the week.” Meanwhile, numerous news outlets, including International Business Times, reported Tuesday that momentum is building nationwide on social media to boycott Black Friday Weekend sales to hit corporate America "where it hurts" over the fatal shooting of Brown. Numerous published reports cite the Times article, which quoted New Black Panther Party member Dacia Polk calling on St. Louisans to “withdraw your participation the entire weekend.” Walmart, meanwhile, is facing additional pushback on Black Friday with nationwide protests organized by OUR (Organization United for Respect) Walmart, which is seeking better working conditions for Walmart employees. Three Walmart stores in the St. Louis area -- including a Sam’s Club location -- are slated to be targeted by protesters, BlackFridayProtests.org said. Walmart didn’t immediately respond to requests for comment on St. Louis-area store closings.
The Retail Action Project (RAP) urged supporters to "show solidarity" for Walmart employees on Black Friday in what it called the "first-ever sit-down strike at Walmart" sponsored by OUR (Organization United for Respect) Walmart. RAP was organizing protesters from New York, offering bus transportation on Black Friday to the Walmart in North Bergen, New Jersey, where it said associates from across the country are planning "even bigger actions to take on Walmart." The actions are intended to support workers who are "standing up for a better future," RAP said Thursday. The pitch letter cited a BuzzFeed article about Walmart workers who sat down in aisles of a Southern California store for about two hours Nov. 13 to draw attention to what they've called “unfair labor practices." Walmart spokesman Kory Lundberg told us: “This is the third year we’ve seen [OUR Walmart] do the same thing.” That a group like RAP would recruit people to go to the demonstration “underscores that the people taking part in this are not Walmart workers,” Lundberg said. “They’re not people who work with the company and not people who are associated with the company,” he said. On whether there will be repercussions for workers who participate in protests, Lundberg said that will be handled on a case-by-case basis. For workers participating “off the clock,” the retailer largely respects the rights of its workers to express themselves, he said. “We’re going to do our best to minimize the disruptions to our customers and our associates from these demonstrations that are mainly made up of folks that don’t work for the company,” he said.
Waiting until a week before the holiday to disclose Thanksgiving merchandising plans and store hours, hhgregg said Monday it’s "doing things differently this year." Last year, hhgregg stores opened at 8 p.m. Thanksgiving Day and stayed open continuously until 10 p.m. on Black Friday. This year, hhgregg stores will open 4 p.m. Thanksgiving Day and close at midnight before reopening at 7 a.m. on Black Friday, the chain said. Moreover, it’s "Black Friday Now" promotion will offer doorbuster savings of up to 40 percent off for 10 days beginning this Thursday and running through Saturday, Nov. 29, it said. Doorbuster specials will include an LG 60-inch LCD TV for $488 and an iPad Air for $299, it said. The decision to close at midnight Thanksgiving Day was an apparent bow to the finding last year that consumers generally didn't shop overnight into the wee hours of Black Friday morning. Other retailers are tracking similar opening and closing hours this year. For example, more than 1,000 Best Buy stores in 47 states will open at 5 p.m. local time on Thanksgiving Day and remain open until 1 a.m. on Black Friday before reopening at 8 a.m. that morning.
New York photo specialty and CE retailer B&H has joined the ProSource buying group, becoming its 17th member, ProSource announced Monday.
The Home Technology Specialists of America (HTSA) added Rye Brook, New York-based Digital Home Systems to its dealer roster. Digital Home Systems is aligned with core HTSA vendors Control4, Integra, Kaleidescape, Pakedge Device & Software, Samsung, Sharp and Sony, the group said. President Tom Manna founded Digital Home Systems in 1999.
Target wants shareholders to reject an unsolicited “mini-tender offer” by TRC Capital to buy up to 2 million shares of Target’s common stock for $59 a share in cash, without interest, or about 0.32 percent of outstanding shares, Target said Tuesday. The offering price is about 4.5 percent below the closing price per share of Target common stock Oct. 30, the last trading day before the mini-tender offer was initiated, Target said. The retailer said the offer price is “below the current market price for Target shares and is subject to numerous conditions, including TRC Capital obtaining sufficient financing necessary to consummate the offer.” Target also recommended that any shareholders who tendered shares to TRC Capital “withdraw those shares by providing the written notice” before the offer expires Dec. 2. According to Target, TRC Capital has made similar unsolicited mini-tender offers for shares of other public companies. Mini-tender offers are designed to seek “less than five percent of a company’s outstanding shares, thereby avoiding many investor protections, including the disclosure and procedural requirements applicable to most bids under United States securities laws,” Target said. The SEC has cautioned investors about mini-tender offers, saying “some bidders make mini-tender offers at below-market prices, hoping that they will catch investors off guard if the investors do not compare the offer price to the current market price,” Target said.
The morphing of Black Friday into Black Friday month continued Friday with Walmart’s announcement that its holiday shopping specials have begun, and deals typically reserved for Black Friday and Cyber Monday will launch after midnight Pacific time Monday, lasting for 24 hours. Amazon announced its own holiday season plans the previous day, including two Deal of the Day offers through Dec. 22 (see 1410300040). Among Walmart's CE deals are a Sony 48-inch LED-backlit TV for $348, a $100 discount; an Element 40-inch LED-backlit set for $199 instead of $298; a Nextbook 7.8-inch tablet with 8 GB storage halved to $49; and a Nintendo 2DS handheld video game system for $79, down from $129. Ahead of this year’s holiday season, Walmart has rolled out a new feature within its mobile app called “Search My Store” that enables customers to see if items carried at a particular store are in stock, which aisle they’re in and their reviews and ratings, the retailer said. The feature is available on the Android app and is due on the iOS app mid-November, it said. Walmart will offer hundreds of weekly online specials on electronics and other categories, it said, with free shipping on orders of $50 or more. CE rollbacks that were to take effect Saturday at Walmart included an Xbox One for $50 off to $349, a Samsung 45-inch TV clipped by $50 to $528, and a 15-inch Dell Inspiron laptop for $479, down from $549, it said. A 50-inch Sceptre LED-lit HDTV was to drop from $379 to $349. Customers who buy Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare Monday and Tuesday can get an additional 50 percent back on a trade-in game, and customers can get double the trade-in value of a video game player when they buy a PS 4 system, Walmart said. The retailer has also begun selling certified, pre-owned video games in 1,700 stores, a follow-up from the trade-in program it launch in March. Meanwhile, Walmart said it will open its 5,000th U.S. location Wednesday, a Neighborhood Market, in Greenbrier, Arkansas.