General
Delhaize and bol.com, both Ahold Delhaize subsidiaries, are increasingly working together. Today they have started a first commercial action together as the "Back to school" campaign kicks off, but the aim is to find more mutual benefits.
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French retailer Géant Casino will trial a with a staff-less hypermarket in Angers. The law on Sunday's rest would be avoided by only employing security personnel, but trade unions fear this will precipitate the end of the job of cashier.
Google's Images pages are increasingly looking like pages of the search engine's Shopping section, now product information and prices, reviews and availability are added to Images search results.
French-Italian optics group EssilorLuxottica has bought its Dutch competitor GrandVision in a deal that values the latter on 7.1 billion euros. The merger of the companies owning the Ray-Ban glasses and Pearle stores respectively is still subject to approval of the competition watchdogs.
The duty-free shops of International Duty Free (IDF) at the Brussels airport will be acquired by the Lagardère group. The French group will pay 250 million to CNP, a Frère family vehicle.
After two years of growth exceeding expectations, the wave of profits at Amazon is now coming to an end. Even though sales and profits have increased, analysts expected more.
The Dutch Blokker Holding has adopted a new name: Mirage Retail Group. This kills two birds with one stone: it avoids confusion between the Holding and the eponymous store chain, and cuts the ties with the former owners.
Nine out of ten start-ups in e-commerce fail within 120 days. Poor online visibility and low demand turn out to be the main issues.
Google is fast becoming an online department store: in the United States, the company has launched the newest version of Google Shopping, including direct checkout and strong personalisation.
Austrian retail group Signa Retail (the owner of German department store chains Karstadt and Galeria Kaufhof) has founded a New Business branch, that should bring about more digital competences and innovation.
Danish toy producer Lego is to open its first two stores in the Netherlands, in Amsterdam and Utrecht. They will open later this year, but well in time for the holiday season, the company says.
This past Prime Day was the most successful one yet for Amazon – keeping in mind the 'tradition' is still young. The hype surrounding it also gave a boost to its main competitors in e-commerce, however.
European Commissioner Margarethe Vestager is opening an official inquest into Amazon, which she believes is treating the sellers on its platform unfairly.
Activists and Amazon employees in the United States and Germany are using the two-day discount event Prime Day to protest against several aspects of the e-commerce giant.
The French government has introduced a tax aimed at large online companies like Amazon. The United Kingdom is looking to follow suit, despite Trump's reprisal threats.
Two Dutch retail organisations have issued a joint report that says non-European webstores such as AliExpress are not in compliance with local regulations. Detailhandel Nederland and Thuiswinkel.org therefore think such shops have a competitive advantage that is deemed unfair.
