Douglas P. Clement
Douglas P. Clement is principal of Boardwalk Media + Communications, a Connecticut-based provider of digital content, branding, social media management, strategic communications and more. Previously Senior Editor and Digital Editor of Connecticut Magazine, and Executive Editor of The Litchfield County Times publishing group, he was named national Editor of the Year by a leading journalism industry group in 2005, won the nation’s top award for lifestyle journalism from the University of Missouri Schools of Journalism seven times, and has covered arts, culture, design and theater regionally for The New York Times.
Hanna Andersson, the Portland, OR-based children’s clothing brand with Swedish roots, was hacked in a magecart attack last fall that exposed customers’ credit card information, including CVV codes, but is just now coming to light. The hack revealed credit card information from transactions between Sept. 16 and Nov. 11, 2019.
The global sleep company Casper, in a crowded field of mattress-in-a-box companies going direct to customer it helped spawn, has been a darling of the business and lifestyle press, That is, until it recently filed for an IPO, and pundits and the business press attacked the CEO for his obsession with a unicorn valuation.
Retail bellwether Target melted the holiday season joy over record holiday ecommerce spending of $142.5 billion, reporting disappointing holiday sales in Q3 as toys and electronics underperformed and the company lowered Q4 comparable sales guidance. Ecommerce was a bright spot, up 19%.
Ecommerce spending in the U.S. for November and December posted a new record at $142.5 billion, up 13.1%, according to data from Adobe, while Salesforce pegged worldwide ecommerce spend at $723 billion, an 8% increase. Smartphones accounted for 84% of the 2019 holiday ecommerce growth in the U.S., Adobe said.
Consumer loyalty is up for grabs in 2020, according to a Criteo study, with 73% of shoppers open to taking a chance on brands they haven’t tried but have heard positive things about. The study quantified the evolution of consumers into detectives who compare products, rely on reviews and increasingly shop across channels.
Coresight Research reported a total of 9,275 U.S. store closures by major retailers in 2019, 35% higher than the 6,897 closures recorded in 2018 as the bleeding continues. Closings outpaced store openings more than 2 to 1, Coresight found, with 4,454 new doors in 2019, compared to 4,311 in 2018.
Direct-to-customer (DTC) brands continued their ascension in 2019 with more than 40% of American consumers making DTC purchases, according to a new report from Diffusion PR. Legacy brands have caught the wave by either acquiring their own DTC brands or investing in their own capabilities.
Direct-to-customer ecommerce startup Resident, whose home furnishing brands include Nectar, DreamCloud, Level, Awara, Wovenly, Bundle and 1771 Living, has raised $12.5 million from Tel Aviv-based Liquidity Capital. Resident will use the capital to drive growth and move into additional home products.
A day after Christmas, UPS affirmed and updated its expectation that it would process just shy of 2 million returns on Jan. 2, 2020, representing a seventh consecutive record-breaking National Returns Day. But is Dec. 26 really the day retailers and ecommerce companies need to pay attention to? You be the judge.
A seeming disconnect between fewer last-order promise dates and faster holiday delivery times is explained by the rising popularity of buy online, pickup in store, according to an annual survey from Kurt Salmon. This season, 53% of retailers didn’t offer a last order promise date to avoid disappointing customers.