Unit Sales Had Small Gain Last Week (publishersweekly.com)

Comparable sales and EPS near the high end of expectations. Third quarter comparable traffic grew 1.4 percent. Comparable sales increased 0.9 percent. Third quarter GAAP EPS from continuing operations of $0.87 and Adjusted EPS1 of $0.91 were near the upper-end of the guidance range of $0.75 to $0.95. Comparable digital channel sales increased 24 percent, on top of 26 percent growth in third quarter 2016. In the third quarter, Target devoted $847 million to capital investment, paid dividends of $339 million, and returned $171 million through share repurchases. Click Read More below for additional information.

IWCO Direct announced a new strategic plan that features the largest investment in the history of the 52-year-old company. The investment of approximately $50 million will accelerate IWCO Direct’s evolution as a leading strategic solutions partner, well-positioned to meet the current and future needs of performance marketers. “With this historic investment in IWCO Direct, we will quickly and significantly enhance the value we can bring to marketers in delivering response and business impact through our strategy, creative, data, and campaign execution,” stated John Ashe, CEO of IWCO Direct.

News site ARLnow is discontinuing a daily newsletter that was created with generative AI. The closure will occur this week as ARLnow launches a new email format for its Afternoon Update. But it could return as it irons out the wrinkles. ARLnow’s morning newsletter was produced with an automated process that provided AI summaries of the previous day’s articles. The morning summaries were generated via ChatGPT APIs “in a writing style somewhat similar to that of Morning Brew,” ARLnow writes.