The holiday sales push is on. The November-December period can account for more than 50% of retailers' sales. CNNMoney reports that Walmart (WMT) is trying to stay ahead of the pack by offering free online shipping on 60,000 items through December 20.

Steve Nave, general manager of Walmart.com said: "Customers are doing all they can to save money this holiday, so we're excited to offer free shipping to home, with no minimum purchase requirement as an early Christmas present to them."

Continue reading Walmart Jumps on the Free-Shiping Bandwagon

Walmart Jumps on the Free-Shiping Bandwagon originally appeared on BloggingStocks on Thu, 11 Nov 2010 11:40:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Walmart (WMT) has created an initiative it's calling "Global.com" that will try to standardize the online and brick-and-mortar interactions customers have in the global markets where it operates.

Walmart Vice Chairman Eduardo Castro-Wright said "now that we have a well-defined blueprint to continue to grow our online business, it's time to leverage our size and global footprint to take advantage of this evolving customer trend." Evolving customer trend? What is this, 2004? It's no longer a trend, Mr. Castro-Wright; it's an absolute customer requirement. Right now.

Continue reading Walmart Creates New Global E-commerce Division

Walmart Creates New Global E-commerce Division originally appeared on BloggingStocks on Tue, 02 Mar 2010 18:30:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Small book retailers were buying in bulk from major online booksellers because they could really save some money. One was buying up to 70 copies of a particular title -- it was $5 less a pop from the big guys than it would have been from the publisher. Finally, however, the big retailers have become wise to the trend and taken action, according to the Wall Street Journal (subscription required).

Wal-Mart (NYSE: WMT), Amazon (NASDAQ: AMZN), and Target (NYSE: TGT) have decided to cap the number of books customers can buy online, a measure intended to prevent smaller competitors from treating them as partners. Walmart is limiting customers to two copies of a particular book, with Amazon placing the border at three and Target at five.

Continue reading Major booksellers didn't realize they were suppliers to rivals

Major booksellers didn't realize they were suppliers to rivals originally appeared on BloggingStocks on Fri, 30 Oct 2009 13:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

People need to eat, and Wal-Mart (NYSE: WMT) sells food. People need to cover themselves, and Wal-Mart sells apparel. You get the idea - the biggest needs may be thin-margin, and their all sure things. Wal-Mart plays in the inevitable, which makes its latest market entry a little less surprising than you might think. Wal-Mart is pushing caskets and urns - depending on how you want your remains preserved. What is a bit shocking, however, is that the brick-and-mortar player is selling its death gear online.

Wal-Mart is using its low price strategy to beat funeral homes, which have seemingly forever been the biggest sales channel for caskets. Prices start at $999 for the low end models and go up to the Sienna Bronze Casket at $3,199. Except for this last one, all models sell for under $2,000 ... and all product ships within 48 hours. The funeral homes are over a barrel on this one, since federal law requires them to accept third-party caskets.

Wal-Mart is supplied by Star Legacy Funeral Network, and both are apparently happy with the first week's sales.

The Bentonville-based retail giant is not the first to get into the gloomy business of bodies. Discount retailer Costco (NASDAQ: COST) is already in the online casket business.

Wal-Mart's latest money-making scheme: Death! originally appeared on BloggingStocks on Thu, 29 Oct 2009 16:15:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Continue reading Not such a Merry Christmas at eBay (EBAY)

Not such a Merry Christmas at eBay (EBAY) originally appeared on BloggingStocks on Tue, 23 Dec 2008 14:40:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Yahoo! and Wal-Mart join forces originally appeared on BloggingStocks on Thu, 05 Jun 2008 10:36:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

The head of Walmart.com says that Halloween sales were particularly strong. And, he thinks the upcoming holiday season will do just as well. "Customers are still spending for the holidays. Halloween was very good for us, so I suspect that Christmas is going to be great," said Raul Vazquez in a talk with Reuters.

The website may be benefiting from the fact that parent Wal-Mart (NYSE: WMT) cut holiday prices early this year, about a month ahead of the normal Thanksgiving weekend time frame.

But there could be other explanations. Wal-Mart has been especially good at tying its website to its stores. Customers can order items on the internet and pick them up at the local retail outlet, saving shipping charges. This combination of convenience and low price may be increasing use of the website.

The other reason the site may be doing well is the rotation away from buying goods in stores and toward buying online. While same-store sales at many big retailers are relatively flat, e-commerce revenue is expected to rise over 20% in the last two months of the year.

Or, there is one other explanation. Wal-Mart may be doing better than most investors think.

Douglas A. McIntyre is an editor at 247wallst.com.

Happy holidays for Walmart.com originally appeared on BloggingStocks on Wed, 07 Nov 2007 09:56:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

The clever folks over at Bernstein Research have figured out that the new Apple set-top box has a problem. The Apple Inc. (NASDAQ :AAPL) iTune store does not have many movies available for download. The count is a paltry 298 films.

Competitors are well ahead in video content. The Bernstein count is 2,407 for the Amazon.com Inc. (NASDAQ: AMZN) Unbox and Wal-Mart Stores Inc.'s (NYSE: WMT) Walmart.com has 1,037.

The Apple TV product is a sort of place marker between the MAC and iPod, which have been driving revenue at the company for the last five years, and the iPhone, which comes out in June. While AT&T Inc. (NYSE: T) says it has gotten one million calls expressing interest in the iPhone, Apple thinks it can sell 10 million iPhones in the first year after it launches. AT&T is the sole U.S. distributor, so a million calls may not bode well for early sales.

The Apple TV could end up being a bust. Without content, it is hard to see it being a big seller. That could hurt Apple's sales in calendar Q2 2007.

Douglas A. McIntyre is a partner at 24/7 Wall St.

Apple TV Achilles' heel -- no content originally appeared on BloggingStocks on Wed, 28 Mar 2007 09:09:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

According to Loren Baker of Search Engine Journal, Wal-Mart Stores, Inc.'s (NYSE:WMT) website, Walmart.com, crashed earlier this morning. The site had a "scheduled-for-maintenance" page.

I agree with SEL and doubt Wal-Mart has really chosen today of all days for scheduled maintenance (especially since Wal-Mart advertised the site as well). Indeed, Wal-Mart may have substantially greater sales in its physical stores, but I don't think the retailer would willingly forgo the online portion of its retail business on one of the busiest shopping days of the year. Yes, despite Black Friday not being Cyber Monday, it still ranks among the top ten busiest online shopping days.

No, it seems more likely that Wal-Mart servers have crashed under the load, further proving that this is a busy day for online shopping, not just mall and stores raiding. Wal-Mart may have also underestimated its own advertising power, suggesting to shoppers to try Wal-Mart's website.

I've tried the Wal-Mart's site and it is now running, but SEL reports the site has been up and down all morning long. I trust/hope Wal-Mart will fix this soon, and if not, be better prepared for Monday or at least for next year. For now, this is a major glitch.

Wal-Mart website crashes today of all days? originally appeared on BloggingStocks on Fri, 24 Nov 2006 11:01:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.