Landmark Theatres will open its first Phoenix unit this fall 2021 with an eight-screen complex at Washington Prime Group’s Scottsdale Quarter in Scottsdale, Arizona. The company operates 220 screens across the country.

Publix GreenWise Market opened its newest location in the redeveloped Water Street neighborhood of Tampa, Florida. It is the second of the company’s new-concept specialty, natural and organic stores to be located in a high-rise, multi-use building. Above the store are two towers of apartment living and a parking garage. Publix GreenWise Market offers a variety of organic groceries, top consumer brands and house-made specialties. The 26,000-square-foot location will be connected to the district cooling system located in Tampa’s Water Street neighborhood. The chilled water from the cooling system provides improved energy efficiency and better stability for the air conditioning and refrigeration systems. This will be the second time Publix has connected to a district cooling system for air conditioning needs but the first time for refrigeration. The first new-concept Publix GreenWise Market is located in Tallahassee, Florida. Nine stores are now open, including the Tampa location. A 10th is planned for St. Augustine, Florida. Publix GreenWise Market is owned by Publix, which operates more than 1,200 grocery stores throughout seven states in the Southeast.

This fall, American Eagle will open an Offline by Aerie store at Empire Mall in Sioux Falls, South Dakota, to sell leggings, bike shorts, tops, sports bras and fleece from its Aerie lingerie brand. The retailer opened the first Offline by Aerie store at CoolSprings Galleria in Franklin, Tennessee, in April and has since opened 12 stores in Connecticut, Delaware, Kansas, Maryland, Massachusetts, New Jersey and Washington, D.C. Stores feature experiential details like custom ping-pong tables and ballet bars in the fitting rooms, plus H2O stations. The company will open another three Offline by Aerie stores this year, in Birmingham, Alabama; Sevierville, Tennessee; and Newport Beach, California.

In the past two years, coworking concept Industrious has opened more than 200,000 square feet of locations in malls and retails centers across the U.S., including Short Hills Mall in New Jersey, Scottsdale Fashion Square in Arizona, Philadelphia Fashion District and Country Club Plaza in Kansas City, Kansas. The newest Industrious location opened this July in a 27,000-square-foot space at the One Colorado Shopping District in Pasadena, California. The company says the units are showing a significant increase in foot traffic. Meanwhile, other retailers are converting some of their selling space into coworking space. HBC, for one, recently announced plans to open its own SaksWorks coworking units in some of its department stores.

Target will put Disney Store boutiques inside another 160 of its 1,900 big-box stores. Disney opened its first 25 Disney Store shops in Target stores in 2019.

DHL Express opened a mobile pop-up store near its headquarters in Plantation, Florida, to serve a growing demand for its international shipping services. The 2,200-cubic-foot, mobile store is 100% off-the-grid, boosted by a solar-powered system with backup batteries, helping reduce energy consumption and contributing to the company’s mission to achieve net-zero emissions by 2050. Created with mobile store design firm Flexetail, the store rests atop a patented hydraulic-lift platform that lowers nearly flush to the ground so customers may easily access the unit either via a window or by entering the store.

“Over the past year, we have installed several mobile pop-up stores across the U.S., and we have seen that customers prefer the speed and convenience of the pop-up, which they can use to quickly create and send shipments without having to enter a physical store or office,” said Chet Paul, senior vice president of commercial for DHL Express U.S. “Known as the gateway to Latin America, South Florida is an important market for international shipping, and this unique model will allow us to reach even more consumers in the area.” DHL operates 3,500 traditional franchised stores.

Walmart launched a crowdsourced delivery service for other retailers called Walmart GoLocal. The service is built on Walmart’s massive delivery infrastructure, which includes the ability to move 160,000 different items from more than 3,000 stores, reaching nearly 70% of the U.S. population. Participating retailers and brands can access Walmart’s delivery network, which includes drones, autonomous vehicles and market fulfillment centers. “In an era where customers have come to expect speed and reliability, it’s more important than ever for businesses to work with a service provider that understands a merchant’s needs,” said John Furner, president and CEO of Walmart U.S. “Walmart has spent years building and scaling commerce capabilities that support our network of more than 4,700 stores, and we look forward to helping other businesses have access to the same reliable, quality and low-cost services.” 

Disc golf brand Flight Factory opened its first brick-and-mortar store on Tippin Avenue in Pensacola, Florida. The store stocks supplies for the increasingly popular sport, plus apparel and accessories.

Designer handbag and accessories reseller Rebag opened its 10th store, a 2,100-square-foot unit on Greenwich Avenue, alongside full-price luxury neighbors Hermes and Saks Fifth Avenue in Greenwich, Connecticut. The store features a self-service kiosk that allows customers to receive instant price quotes on the items they're selling, using a proprietary technology backed by seven years of data and millions of image references that instantly determines the resale value of more than 15,000 styles of handbags.

This fall, Urban Outfitters will launch its own online, secondhand apparel marketplace that customers can access through a smartphone app called Nuuly Thrift. The company joins Lululemon and Macy’s in targeting the growing secondhand market.

Stores played a crucial role in helping Kohl’s boost its second-quarter digital sales by 35% compared to the same period a year ago, CEO Michelle Gass said on the retailer’s second-quarter earnings call. “Stores fulfilled nearly 40% of digital sales through ship-from-store and customer pickup,” she said. The retailer is testing new services like self-returns and self-pickup this fall to help its stores be more convenient and efficient.

The new iChina restaurant at URW’s Westfield Valley Fair mall in Santa Clara, California, features a private dining room equipped with eight video projectors that transport diners to scenes that pair with their meal, including a Chinese lantern festival and a bamboo forest. The experience starts at $4,500 for 12 people. Another private dining room is equipped with a smart mirror that turns from opaque to clear with the touch of a button to let the diners peek into the kitchen to see their food being prepared.

Basketball star Shaquille O’Neal’s fast-casual concept Big Chicken wants to grow through franchising. The restaurant chain has seven new locations underway, including units on Carnival cruise ships and in sporting arenas. Backed by franchise maven Authentic Brands and Las Vegas catering firm JRS Hospitality, Big Chicken already operates three locations.

Ross Stores expects to open approximately 65 total locations this year, comprised of about 45 Ross and 20 DD’s Discounts stores. The retailer plans to close or relocate about 10 stores before year’s end. In 2022, Ross expects to return to its normal annual opening program of approximately 100 new stores, president and COO Michael Hatshorn said on the retailer’s second-quarter earnings call. “There’s market share up for grab with store closures and bankruptcies,” he added.

Specialty retailer Francesca’s launched a collection of items for younger consumers, called Franki, earlier this year and is already negotiating with landlords to open two standalone stores to support the concept before the holiday season kicks off. TerraMar Capital and Tiger Capital purchased the 500-store Texas chain out of bankruptcy protection last year.

Best Buy is rethinking how it uses stores for fulfillment. Next month, the consumer electronics retailer will be piloting a ship-from-store hub model to help handle what it expects to be increasingly significant online sales volume, CEO Corie Barry told investors on the retailer’s second-quarter earnings call. “All our stores will still ship out online orders, but approximately 250 locations will be positioned to ship out significantly more volume,” she said. “These locations were chosen for their space, proximity to carrier partners and ability to support same and next-day delivery. Over time, this should allow us to deliver a more productive fulfillment model.” Best Buy also is adding more third-party physical pickup locations for online orders and now has more than 16,000 such pickups covering 85% of the population within five miles, she added.

Spergo, an urban sportswear brand with a 15-year-old CEO, will open its second store at Arlington, Virginia’s Pentagon City Mall in October after testing a pop-up unit at the property.