Shop Talk
Retailers, consumers and prices
Target wants shoppers to squeeze the (supersized) Charmin
Grab that shopping cart – you’re going to need it.
To lure post holiday shoppers this year, Target has scrapped its typical plan of stocking its stores with exotic home goods sourced from across this globe.
Instead, it has cleared out the Christmas trees and holiday lights to make room for a mini warehouse club.
Target is stocking 12-packs of giant up & up paper towels for $13.49, and 24-packs of triple roll Charmin toilet paper for $17.99.
Mixed in with the bulk-sized packages, Target is putting in “treasure hunt” items — a tactic used at No. 1 U.S. warehouse club giant Costco. It will be selling Ed Hardy handbags and shirts for between $34.99 and $64.99, and Ralph Lauren polo shirts for boys and girls for less than $25.
Finding the humor in it all
There are very few things to laugh about in the retail world at the moment, but JP Morgan analyst Brian Tunick did a great job of adding some humor to what was a difficult week, especially for Gymboree.
Gymboree gave a bleak forecast for its first quarter, saying regulatory changes related the Consumer Product Safety Improvement Act passed by the Congress in August 2008 will impact sales and gross margins in the first half of 2009. The act required the Consumer Product Safety Commission to begin enforcement of new lead and phthalate standards for children’s products on Feb. 10, 2009.
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