L Brands Reports January 2018 Sales

Pier 1 Imports, Inc. announced that it has received approval from the U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the Eastern District of Virginia for the Company’s planned wind-down of operations. Pier 1 intends to initiate store closing efforts and liquidation sales once store locations can reopen, in compliance with COVID-19 guidelines from local government and health officials. The Company plans to conclude its liquidation sales by the end of October. “This is not the outcome we hoped for when we began this process, and we are deeply saddened to move forward with winding down Pier 1,” said Robert Riesbeck, Pier 1’s Chief Executive Officer and Chief Financial Officer. “We are incredibly grateful to everyone who has supported Pier 1 since the Company’s inception nearly 60 years ago, including our committed associates, passionate customers and talented vendors.” In connection with the wind-down and as previously announced, Pier 1 intends to sell its remaining assets, including its intellectual property and e-commerce business, pursuant to the bidding procedures established in February 2020. The Court today set July 1, 2020 as the asset bid deadline, July 8, 2020 as the auction date and July 15, 2020 as the sale hearing date. Pier 1 is currently continuing to serve customers through Pier1.com, and orders are being processed and filled.

The move to increase the minimum wage gained significant ground in 2020 on the state level. Twenty-five states will raise the minimum wage in 2021, with 21 of those states enacting the increases on January 1, according to payroll experts at Wolters Kluwer Legal & Regulatory U.S. The firm noted that some of the hikes in states such as California, Colorado, Maine, Washington are the result of previously approved incremental increases to reach a specific amount that is considered to be a "living wage." Other states' increases reflect an annual cost-of-living adjustment, which accounts for the changes in states like Alaska, Florida, Minnesota, and Montana.

The U.S. ad market has fully recovered from the recession of 2020-21, with full calendar-year spending rising 18% vs. 2020, and 9% vs. 2019, according to a Standard Media Index analysis of the U.S. Ad Market Tracker, a collaboration with MediaPost indexing total U.S. ad spending from the pool of agency holding companies and independent agencies' actual media buys. A separate analysis of month-by-month data by MediaPost, however, reveals that the expansion has been decelerating through year-end 2021 (see related story). As robust as the recovery has been, SMI's analysis indicates it has been far from even across the major media.