Retail
Staff -- Home Accents Today, 9/1/2005
Federated Department Stores has received the Points of Light Foundation Award for Excellence in Workplace Volunteer Programs, in recognition of its commitment to community service through the company's Partners in Time employee volunteer program.
This international award honors businesses and industries that have made a commitment to effectively engage employees in volunteering.
Federated's community commitment is put into action with Partners in Time, its employee volunteer program founded in 1989. Since then, 1.1 million hours of service have impacted 230 cities nationwide, valued at more than $18 million. About 50,000 volunteers in 500 Macy's and Bloomingdale's stores and Federated support divisions make a difference through 2,500 projects annually. The program is locally driven, with children and school partnerships receiving the greatest support. Other projects benefit hunger relief, through the annual "Bag Hunger" food campaign that collected 4.5 million pounds of food this summer, health and women's issues.- In other news, Federated, owner of Bloomingdale's and Macy 's and soon to be Marshall Field's, is taking a cue from Marshall Field's flagship State Street store in Chicago and setting up boutiques in Bloomies. For now the boutiques are focused on apparel and feature designer labels like DKNY, Ellen Tracy and more. Though Bloomies has had vendor shops for years, this new initiative involves vendors designing shops exclusive to Bloomies. There's no word yet on whether Marshall Field's will be renamed, but Federated has announced that May's other chains will be converted to the Macy's nameplate in fall 2006.
- Atlanta-based Havertys will open its first Central Ohio store in Polaris before the holiday retail season. The 120-year-old company has been expanding in the Midwest and the 40,000-sq.-ft. Polaris store will be the company's second showroom in Ohio. It opened a Cincinnati store last October. A third Midwest store is under construction in Indianapolis.
- Mulberry, Fla.-based W.S. Badcock is looking to add three to five stores to the Nashville area. The Badcock dealer in Madison, Cookeville and Murfreesboro, Tenn. — Jaime Vergara — wants to break ground this year. Though sites have not been named, he is looking in Clarksville, Gallatin, Lebanon and Oak Ridge. Badcock's first Tennessee store opened in Athens in November 1989. The Murfreesboro store opened in April 1994 and the Madison store opened in November 2002.
Ikea will open its second Chicago-area store this month in Bolingbrook. The 310,00-sq.-ft. store has features found in most Ikeas, a restaurant, supervised play area and thousands of home furnishings and accessories. The store opens to the public Sept. 28.
Costco signed a deal with Truescents, a maker of deluxe brand bath and body products, in which it will be the exclusive producer of Costco's private label Kirkland Signature Moisturizing Bath and Body Bars. The bars, which are available at all of Costco's 457 stores, are made from coconut and palm oils and vegetable glycerin and are sold in a set of 14 bars for $8.
- For the first time in its 80-year history, The New Yorker magazine had a single advertiser for its Aug. 22 issue — Target. The issue is filled with Target ads, which are illustrations saluting New York City rendered by more than two dozen artists. The retailer has been the sole sponsor of issues of magazines before, including People. The drawings in the Target ads feature subway motifs, street and park scenes, a dog walker, a cocktail party, even a bridge rendered as a shoe. The only rules the artists were given was that the ads had to use the bull's-eye, have a New York theme and be done in black, white and red. Neither Target nor The New Yorker (part of the Condé Nast Publications division of Advance Publications) would disclose what the sponsorship cost, but from the rate card a steady advertiser like Target would pay about $1.1 million for the ads if there was no discount.
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