OT Amazon and Wal-Mart might be fighting over Nordstrom next, Foursquare says

https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.cn...ict-next-acquisitions-by-amazon-wal-mart.html

• Foursquare, which is able to track where users are "checking in," has made a prediction of the retailers it believes Wal-Mart and Amazon might go after next.
• Both companies have been on buying sprees of late.
• The suggested buy list includes retailers like Nordstrom, Warby Parker, Ulta and Lowe's.

After Amazon announced its plan to acquire Whole Foods, the market started buzzingabout the internet giant's next potential acquisition.

Then there's big-box retailer Wal-Mart, which has also been on a buying spree of late.

The two companies are competing for the same shoppers, as one attempts to step into the other's core area of focus — Wal-Mart growing its e-commerce platform, and Amazon expanding a portfolio of real estate.


All things considered, location intelligence company Foursquare, which is able to track where users are "checking in," has made a prediction of the retailers it believes Wal-Mart and Amazon might go after next.

"We can make informed recommendations about which brands Amazon and Walmart should target next using our proprietary data-driven insights," Foursquare CEO Jeff Glueck said in a blog post Wednesday.

Foursquare analyzed foot traffic trails from more than 2.5 million Americans, anonymously, between January 2016 and June 2017.

The acquisition that makes the most sense, for both companies, is department store chain Nordstrom, Glueck said. This prediction comes as the Nordstrom family has been searching for its own buyer, hoping to take the company private.

A representative from Nordstrom didn't immediately respond to CNBC's request for comment on this story.

Nordstrom shoppers are about two times more likely to shop at Whole Foods than the average consumer, according to Foursquare, so that's where a deal with Amazon begins to make sense. "An Amazon-owned Nordstrom chain would deepen Amazon's relationships with its expanding core base," Glueck said.

View Related Chart

Source: Foursquare

Meanwhile, Wal-Mart might want a company like Nordstrom in its portfolio to capture more millennial shoppers; Nordstrom shoppers are, on average, 55 percent less likely to shop at Wal-Mart than other American consumers, Foursquare found.

Following a similar trend of Wal-Mart acquiring more millennial-friendly apparel brands ModCloth and Bonobos, "A Nordstrom purchase would help Walmart further develop the expertise to combat Amazon," Glueck said.

Another retailer that would make sense for both Amazon and Wal-Mart to consider acquiring is Warby Parker, Foursquare says.

In this deal, Amazon would learn from Warby's "showroom experiments" in the brick-and-mortar world, while Wal-Mart could "lure Warby ladies into its big-box stores."

In picking one unique partnership for both Amazon and Wal-Mart, Foursquare has suggested the internet giant acquire Lowe'sand the big-box retailer look to Ulta Beauty.

"Amazon loves to win, so imagine what would happen if they cut prices and sacrificed margin to compete for marketshare, further growing their share of DIY homeowners," Glueck wrote about Lowe's working with the e-commerce conglomerate.

Meantime, in Ulta Wal-Mart would find a loyal customer base.

"Our data also shows that there are a wide swath of Ulta shoppers who are just as likely as the average consumer to visit Walmart, whereas another cosmetics brand — Sephora, for example would be less of a willing convert to an Ulta/Walmart store," Glueck said.

"Walmart likely covets Ulta's customer base."

It's true, beauty marks a bright spot in retail today as apparel companies and other specialty names are struggling to keep pace with change.

And home improvement companies Home Depot and Lowe's have already seen their stocks take somewhat of a hit on fears that they aren't "Amazon-proof."

Notably, in the spring of 2016, Foursquare CEO Glueck told CNBC he was predicting Chipotle's comparable sales would fall by 29 percent in its first quarter, based on user data tracked via the company's app. Two weeks later, Chipotle reported sales dropped 29.7 percent.

Amazon, Wal-Mart, Warby Parker, Lowe's and Ulta did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

 

I'm kinda mad that Walmart bought Bonobos, love their pants.

 

I wasn't aware Walmart bought Bonobos. I like there shorts and pants.

 

How come we don't enforce the Sherman Anti-Trust Act?

https://www.ourdocuments.gov/doc.php?flash=false&doc=51

Approved July 2, 1890, The Sherman Anti-Trust Act was the first Federal act that outlawed monopolistic business practices.

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The Sherman Antitrust Act of 1890 was the first measure passed by the U.S. Congress to prohibit trusts. It was named for Senator John Sherman of Ohio, who was a chairman of the Senate finance committee and the Secretary of the Treasury under President Hayes. Several states had passed similar laws, but they were limited to intrastate businesses. The Sherman Antitrust Act was based on the constitutional power of Congress to regulate interstate commerce. (For more background, see previous milestone documents: the Constitution, Gibbons v. Ogden, and the Interstate Commerce Act.) The Sherman Anti-Trust Act passed the Senate by a vote of 51–1 on April 8, 1890, and the House by a unanimous vote of 242–0 on June 20, 1890. President Benjamin Harrison signed the bill into law on July 2, 1890.

A trust was an arrangement by which stockholders in several companies transferred their shares to a single set of trustees. In exchange, the stockholders received a certificate entitling them to a specified share of the consolidated earnings of the jointly managed companies. The trusts came to dominate a number of major industries, destroying competition. For example, on January 2, 1882, the Standard Oil Trust was formed. Attorney Samuel Dodd of Standard Oil first had the idea of a trust. A board of trustees was set up, and all the Standard properties were placed in its hands. Every stockholder received 20 trust certificates for each share of Standard Oil stock. All the profits of the component companies were sent to the nine trustees, who determined the dividends. The nine trustees elected the directors and officers of all the component companies. This allowed the Standard Oil to function as a monopoly since the nine trustees ran all the component companies.

The Sherman Act authorized the Federal Government to institute proceedings against trusts in order to dissolve them. Any combination “in the form of trust or otherwise that was in restraint of trade or commerce among the several states, or with foreign nations” was declared illegal. Persons forming such combinations were subject to fines of $5,000 and a year in jail. Individuals and companies suffering losses because of trusts were permitted to sue in Federal court for triple damages. The Sherman Act was designed to restore competition but was loosely worded and failed to define such critical terms as “trust,” “combination,” “conspiracy,” and “monopoly.” Five years later, the Supreme Court dismantled the Sherman Act in United States v. E. C. Knight Company (1895). The Court ruled that the American Sugar Refining Company, one of the other defendants in the case, had not violated the law even though the company controlled about 98 percent of all sugar refining in the United States. The Court opinion reasoned that the company’s control of manufacture did not constitute a control of trade.

The Court’s ruling in E. C. Knight seemed to end any government regulation of trusts. In spite of this, during President Theodore Roosevelt’s “trust busting” campaigns at the turn of the century, the Sherman Act was used with considerable success. In 1904 the Court upheld the government’s suit to dissolve the Northern Securities Company in State of Minnesota v. Northern Securities Company. By 1911, President Taft had used the act against the Standard Oil Company and the American Tobacco Company. In the late 1990s, in another effort to ensure a competitive free market system, the Federal Government used the Sherman Act, then over 100 years old, against

 

Good question.

 

Lol fixed.

 

I've never heard of Bonobos before so I just googled it. Damn, their stuff is expensive!

 

Blame Trump

 

Isn't a Bonobo a type of monkey?

 

JNCO is a type of Monkey too.

 

That one could actually raise anti-competitive issues - with Amazon Instant Video, Hulu and Netflix being the 3 largest streaming services - why Apple does not try to buy Netflix is beyond me. This is exactly the kind of content play they need - and they sure have tons of money to do it.

 

I believe Netflix, Amazon and Hulu are the biggest one as far as streaming is concerned that does not include user-created content (in that case it is Netflix, YouTube, Amazon as the big 3).

I just have a feeling that the administration that seems against Amazon is a lot more likely to go after them if they go after Netflix.

 

Amazon has good content, they have terrible apps. I literally told my wife last night that they should at least buy the app from Netflix. Tonight I searched for the band Free and got this...had to click see all and it was the 5th one. Stupid