Brick-and-mortar retailers continue to take a major hit amid the coronavirus pandemic, forcing many to come up with creative ways to reach customers. The Associated Press reports:
Long before there was a global coronavirus pandemic, brick-and-mortar retailers struggled to get people to walk through their doors instead of shopping online.
Now those retailers are faced with an even more Herculean task: how to stay on people’s minds and more importantly their pocketbooks when many of their store doors are closed.
More than 250,000 stores like Macy’s, Nordstrom and Nike that sell non-essential merchandise have temporarily shuttered since mid-March in response to the pandemic. Thats 60% of overall U.S. retail square footage, according to Neil Saunders, managing director of GlobalData Retail.
“Retail has hung a closed sign on the door literally and metaphorically,” Saunders said. “This is the most catastrophic crisis that retail has faced worse than the financial crisis in 2008, worse than 9/11. Almost overnight, the retail economy shifted from being about things people want to things that they need.”
Some retailers have responded to the challenge by coming up with creative ways to stay relevant. Nike, for instance, introduced workout apps in China when the coronavirus first surfaced there, resulting in an 80% increase in users within the quarter and a 30% increase in online sales. It’s now pushing a similar campaign in the U.S. and Europe.
Yoga pants maker Lululemon is holding online classes in North America and Europe after gaining thousands of new followers in China on WeChat. Lululemon CEO Calvin McDonald told analysts during a recent call that during its first week of closures in the U.S., it saw nearly 170,000 customers join Lululemon for its live classes.
Small businesses are also pivoting in order to hold onto customers. Camp, a new toy chain that set itself apart from online retailers by doubling down on the physical experience, is hosting virtual birthday parties and creating curated gift boxes now that its five stores have gone dark. Politics & Prose, a popular Washington D.C. bookstore, was also forced to temporarily close and is now starting to stream author talks online and offering a curbside pickup service.
Joe Biden, the presumptive Democratic nominee for president, has outlined his plan to safely reopen the United States in an op-ed published in today’s New York Times.
His three steps include: 1) getting the number of new cases down significantly through continued social distancing and improved supply lines to our hospitals with a more thorough deployment of the Defense Production Act; 2) the establishment of widespread, easily available and prompt testing with contact tracing strategy that protects privacy; and 3) increasing the capacity of our healthcare system to protect against the potential flare-up of cases when economic activity reopens.
“For more Americans to go back to their jobs, the president needs to do better at his job,” Biden wrote.
As if Trump, the great counterpuncher, was going to take that lying down. Moments ago, he fired off a tweet that appeared to take aim at Times and, more broadly, the “Lamestream Media”, a wordplay popularized by former Alaska governor and 2008 vice presidential candidate.
The Opposition Party (Lamestream Media) and their partner, the Radical Left, Do Nothing Democrats, have put their political game plan in full swing. “Whether he is right or wrong, it doesn’t matter. Criticize ’Trump’ for everything, and don’t let the public see Biden. Hide him.”
Illinois’ governor, JB Pritzker, expressed hope that his state’s coronavirus figures are leveling off during Sunday’s daily press briefing in Chicago, despite the largest one-day increase of infections to date.
Pritzker said the increase of 1,672 cases in the last 24 hours can be attributed in part to increased testing statewide, saying: “I’ve spoken before about a stabilizing or bending of the curve and today is one more piece of evidence that it may indeed be happening.”
The governor reported 43 additional lives lost to the virus in the last day, bringing the overall total to 720, but noted it is the lowest death count since last weekend. He lauded Illinoisans adherence to social distancing and other preventative measures, also expressing thanks for a shipment of 100,000 N95 masks courtesy of Apple and company founder Tim Cook.
If the Fake News Opposition Party is pushing, with all their might, the fact that President Trump “ignored early warnings about the threat,” then why did Media & Dems viciously criticize me when I instituted a Travel Ban on China? They said “early & not necessary.” Corrupt Media!
“If the Fake News Opposition Party is pushing, with all their might, the fact that President Trump ‘ignored early warnings about the threat,’ then why did Media & Dems viciously criticize me when I instituted a Travel Ban on China,” wrote the president this afternoon. “They said ‘early & not necessary.’ Corrupt Media!”
Fauci, a prominent government health adviser, appeared to confirm the Times report earlier on Sunday. Asked on CNN’s State of the Union why the administration did not act when he and other officials advised, Fauci said: “You know … as I have said many times, we look at it from a pure health standpoint. We make a recommendation. Often, the recommendation is taken. Sometimes, it’s not ... It is what it is. We are where we are right now.”
Storms and tornadoes have hit the south today with 20 states, including Texas, Mississippi, Alabama and Louisiana, affected. That raises two dangers for residents -– Covid-19 and the elements. However, the Mississippi Emergency Management Agency said that people should prioritize shelter over social distancing in the case of emergency.
Director Michel and our team are monitoring the weather and standby ready to assist. Have a safe place to go. If you go to a public shelter please wear a mask, bandana, or scarf around your nose and mouth. Practice social distancing. We will get through this! pic.twitter.com/owoDLwL3rI
“Have a safe place to go. If you go to a public shelter please wear a mask, bandana, or scarf around your nose and mouth. Practice social distancing. We will get through this,” wrote the agency in a tweet.
Louisiana, which has the fourth-highest number of deaths of any state despite ranking only 25th in population, has reported a drop in deaths. The 34 deaths from Covid-19 reported on Sunday was the lowest total in Louisiana since 1 April. Fears the state will run out of ventilators and intensive care beds have also eased. 840 people have now reported to have died from the virus in Louisiana since the start of the outbreak.
The New Orleans Times-Picayune also reports that the number of most serious crimes, such as homicide and robberies, have fallen since Mayor LaToya Cantrell ordered the closing of most businesses in the city last month. However, other crimes such as some categories of domestic violence and shoplifting have risen.
A friend who Donald Trump alluded to when detailing his experiences with Covid-19 has died from the virus. The Real Deal, which covers the New York real estate industry, identified the man as Stanley I Chera when it reported his death on Saturday. Chera’s identity was then confirmed to the Associated Press by a White House official. Chera was in his late 70s and involved in the real estate business and had donated money to the Trump campaign.
The president mentioned Chera, but did not identify him, when he spoke about the effects of Covid-19 on 29 March. “I had a friend who went to a hospital the other day. He’s a little older, and he’s heavy, but he’s [a] tough person,” Trump said. “And he went to the hospital, and a day later, he’s in a coma ... he’s not doing well ... The speed and the viciousness, especially if it gets the right person, it’s horrible. It’s really horrible.”
Trump mentioned Chera at a 2019 rally when he described him as “one of the biggest builders and real estate people in the world.” The president added: “He’s a great guy, and he’s been with me from the beginning.”
The Associated Press spoke to a New York cab driver as part of a project to gauge the effect of the pandemic on the nation’s workers. Nicolae Hent has been a cab driver in the city since 1988 and said he no longer bothers heading to JFK airport for lucrative fares as there are almost no passengers. He said on a good day he used to be able to earn $300 but the figure is more like $100 since the start of the lockdown.
He said the best places to look for a fare are hospitals. “That’s where the customers are now,” Hent told AP last week. “Hospital workers, nurses, doctors, and where there are stores for food.”
He said once the day shift at hospitals ends around 7pm he heads home too. “Then there’s no reason to stay on the street, because there’s nobody,” he said.
The first wave of stimulus checks were sent out to Americans on Saturday, the IRS has confirmed.
“We know many people are anxious to get their payments; we’ll continue issuing them as fast as we can,” the tax service said in a Twitter post.
The first to receive direct deposits are tax payers who have filed tax returns for 2018 or 2019 and authorized direct deposit. Others may have to wait weeks or months to receive disbursement authorized under a $2.2tn stimulus package passed by Congress last month.
Individuals are due up to $1,200 and couples will receive up to $2,400 – plus $500 a child. Tax payers with adjusted gross incomes of more than $75,000 will receive less according to sliding scale, with eligibility capped at $99,000. Qualification thresholds are double for couples.
According to a memo issued by democrats, the IRS anticipates issuing paper checks starting in the first week of May. The checks will be issued at a rate of about five million per week, the memo says. The service has until the end of 2020 to make the transfers.
One day after Donald Trump declared Wyoming a disaster area due to the coronavirus outbreak, the US president framed it in the broader context of national victory – namely, winning – on Sunday afternoon.
For the first time in history there is a fully signed Presidential Disaster Declaration for all 50 States. We are winning, and will win, the war on the Invisible Enemy!
According to White House deputy press secretary Judd Deere, it is the first time a disaster declaration has been in effect in all 50 states at once. As of Sunday afternoon, the overall US toll from the pandemic has surpassed 21,300 deaths and more than half a million confirmed cases.
Richard Luscombe has news on Joe Biden’s movements over the weekend...
From a basement in deepest Wilmington, Delaware, comes a special Easter Sunday edition of the popular podcast Here’s the Deal. Its host is none other than Joe Biden, the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee, chewing the fat with Reverend William J Barber II, the prominent activist, Protestant minister and board member of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP).
In lockdown and unable to command national attention in the way he would like, Biden has turned to the internet to spread his message. Today’s podcast, the third of a series launched just over a week ago, deals with the coronavirus, a return to civility in the US, and “this guy in the White House.”
“I’ve preached about the soul of America and how we had to restore it,” Biden says, referring to a central tenet of his campaign to unseat Donald Trump in November.
“Well, you’re seeing it not just in those poor folks out there making the minimum wage and busting their neck and putting their lives on the line to help everybody else, you’re seeing it with acts of kindness that haven’t occurred in a long time across the board, in white communities, Asian communities, black communities, Latino communities.
“And that, I pray God, is going to be contagious.”
In the podcast, Biden and Barber discuss their faith, hope that comes from the Easter story and the long fight for civil rights and racial equality in the US.
“God doesn’t bring us viruses, but God works in the midst of pain, just like God worked in the midst of the slavery of the Hebrew people in ancient Israel,” Barber said.
Despite the religious overlay, Biden’s podcast did not stray far from the political. People’s experiences with the pandemic, the vice-president believes, have made them more appreciative of social policy.
“If Hillary had won, if we didn’t have this guy in the White House, it would have been very hard for Hillary to sell some of the things she wanted to sell, and the things that I want to sell, that Bernie wanted to sell, because people didn’t quite get it.
“People now understand. When’s the last time people walked out and thanked the guy who’s cleaning the sewer, for keeping his basement from backing up? When’s the last time that somebody walked out and said, ‘Hey, thanks?’
“Well, people now are seeing every single day people busting their neck, risking their lives, to save other people, these first responders, these nurses, the people that are out there in the ambulances… People are getting their eyes opened.”
Biden also has thoughts about the financial hardships people are experiencing.
“We should freeze all evictions for rent, we should freeze mortgage payments, we should be increasing social security payments right now by at least another $200 a month, we should be forgiving student debt,” he said.
“We’re going to need a lot more money spent to deal with this crisis and the aftermath of this crisis.”
