January online retail sales grow at much faster pace than total sales (digitalcommerce360.com)

July 1. That’s the expiration date for the contract that covers the International Longshore and Warehouse Union’s more than 22,000 workers at the 29 ports along the West Coast. Negotiations are ongoing, but experts think it is unlikely a deal will be reached before July 1. (In the past, contract talks have run beyond the expiration date and led to major disruptions to port operations.) The stakes are especially high this time around, however, as the negotiations are playing out amid a backdrop of global supply chain disruptions. Chain Store Age spoke with Spencer Shute, senior consultant at procurement and supply chain consultancy Proxima, part of Bain & Company, about the possibility of a shutdown and its impact on retailers.

On the closing day of the American Booksellers Association Winter Institute 2023, a keynote and idea exchange tackled book banning and other threats to the freedom to read. Stories of outrage were easy to come by: booksellers report going uninvited to book fairs, moving children’s books off tables occupied by general “adult” titles, or second-guessing whether to host Drag Queen Story Time. But solutions were in shorter supply. Booksellers are frustrated with schools’ and libraries’ capitulations to uninformed book challenges, despite understanding the fears of harassment and violence driving those chilling decisions. ABA chief communications officer Ray Daniels moderated a panel that included Gender Queer author Maia Kobabe, Rediscovered Books co-owner Laura DeLaney, Green Feather Book Company proprietor Heather Hall, and Kendrick Washington, director of policy at the ACLU of Washington. “I have had a wild ride over the past couple of years,” said Kobabe, whose memoir tops the American Library Association’s list of 10 most-challenged books. “I have seen a rise of book sales, but I think most of those sales are to adults and people who listen to NPR. People in book deserts are the ones missing out. We shouldn’t have to have a lawsuit in every single school district just to have the books in schools and libraries. It’s such a drain on resources.”

If you buy a Lego set today, the toy bricks come packed in tiny numbered plastic bags. Every year, the toy manufacturer uses hundreds of millions of those bags. But the company is starting to phase out single-use plastic, with the goal of making its packaging sustainable by 2025—and those bags are a big part of it. Next year, it will begin rolling out an alternative, with bricks packed in Forest Stewardship Council-certified paper instead. “We want to ensure recycling our bags is as easy as possible for builders,” says Tim Brooks, vice president of environmental responsibility at the Lego Group. “Plastic recycling facilities are not very common and differ from country to country, which is why we chose to make the bags out of recyclable paper.” The company tested new packaging options extensively, searching for something that would be sustainable but also strong enough to hold Lego bricks, easy to pack in boxes, and something that children liked to use. “We tested about 15 different prototypes with hundreds of children and parents but explored many more, including those made from recycled plastic and even paper made from stone,” Brooks says.