Evan Schuman

When Amazon unveiled its wireless Kindle device Nov. 19, expectations were high. Could the company that tamed the Web get its hand around wireless? Many of the initial media and analyst reviews of the device were less than favorable, pointing out things like an inability to flip through pages and buttons that obscured some viewing […]

In its annual survey of major retail return policies, ConsumerWorld made its list and checked it twice of return policies that are naughty and nice. Sports Authority, some Staples stores, KB Toys, The Limited and Express got on the naughty list because of their use of The Return Exchange’s database to limit customer returns. “Some […]

Retail IT leaders today are still struggling with RFID, and finding a way to salvage years of effort and eek out some provable profits. Staples Canada this week detailed some impressive results with reusable active-tag RFID, delivering an attractive 8-cent/chip cost, an extremely accurate read rate, a sharp reduction of out-of-stocks and even a huge […]

A one-store RFID trial that Staples ran this summer with reusable tags was successful enough to convince the retailer to expand it to four other stores in mid-February of 2008, said the retail chains IT executive in charge of the project. The initial Staples Canada trial was an attempt to see if the key argument […]

E-tailers are getting better at customer service and delivering usable Web sites, with Overstock, Lowe’s, Ralph Lauren and Kmart leading the way, according to a new report from The Customer Respect Group. In the customer service area, one of the things that has gotten the most favorable attention has been click-to-call, with some of the […]

TJX learned of its massive data breach on Oct 3, 2006, more than two months earlier than it told the government it first learned of the breach, according to an attorney representing one of the banks suing the retail chain. Getting to the bottom of these “he said/she said” exchanges—which is necessary to put these […]

The worst credit card data breach in history is a federal case no more. A federal judge overseeing the TJX cases in effect fired himself as TJX judge on Tuesday, and ordered the case out of federal court and into Massachusetts state court. U.S. District Court Judge William Young also praised Visa as a “hero” […]

A recent column about the lack of visible presence with digital signage prompted some interesting reader responses, but our favorite was the comment from the CIO of a large national chain who pointed out that IT’s lack of visibility is more likely an indication that IT is spotting problems others don’t want to see. “Occasionally, […]

Although the top alternative payment options today can hardly be called mainstream, the adoption rate of the top three has continued to soar, with almost one out of every three major e-tailers accepting at least one, according to a new study from Brulant. That 30 percent of major e-tailers accepting alternative payment in November is […]

Another giftcard exchange site company has emerged, but this one—a company called Leverage—is focusing on the tremendous customer information inherent in a pile of giftcards. Leverage’s vision is not radically different than other giftcard firms—such as PlasticJungle—but it’s focus on the CRM aspect is. Some 40 percent of the cards will come directly from retailers […]

As a retailer defending itself because of the world’s worst data breach, TJX has turned over more than 2.5 million pages of documents. That—plus the decision to appeal and some shifting of the blame to MasterCard—were the highlights from a series of federal filings late Dec. 6. In an anticipated move, lawyers for the banks […]

An in-house attorney for J.C. Penney testified before a congressional committee Dec. 6 that e-tailers should be taxed to “level the playing field” with brick-and-mortar retailers who already have to pay such taxes. “We are here to ask you to level the playing field between sellers that collect sales tax and those who cannot be […]