Aug. 19, 2021: Today I found this article.
Oct. 28, 2020 "Canadian entrepreneur launching T. Kettle tea chain from the ashes of 45 shuttered Davids Tea locations": This article is by Pete Evans on CBC News:
A Canadian entrepreneur with a track record of retail turnarounds is launching a chain of tea shops across the U.S. and Canada, out of recently closed DavidsTea locations.
Doug Putman, the owner of Sunrise Records, is set to open 45 locations across nine Canadian provinces and six U.S. states this weekend.
Named T. Kettle, the chain will have about 250 employees when they open, which is expected to happen this Sunday, Nov. 1. And the chain hopes to expand beyond that.
Waylaid by the COVID-19 pandemic that walloped foot traffic to malls and stores,
DavidsTea went into insolvency proceedings this summer and shortly after announced plans to close about 200 locations and focus more on selling tea online.
The Montreal-based tea shop says it will still have 18 locations when all is said and done, but that's a drastically reduced retail footprint.
The tea shop is just one of many retailers to have been hit hard by the pandemic including
clothier Reitmans,
fashion chain Le Château,
outdoor gear sellers MEC a
nd Sail,
fashion chain Mendocino, the company that owns Ricki's Cleo and Bootlegger, and shoe retailer Aldo.
Retail sales overall only recently got back to the level they were at before the pandemic, and even then unevenly so, as there are wildly different situations in different areas and sectors.
But while the carnage is continuing in some sectors of retail, Putman sees an opportunity.
"When we found that they were filing for bankruptcy we were thinking about it, and then when they said they were closing all their stores, I started reaching out to landlords," Putman told CBC News in an interview. "Sure enough everyone was pretty interested."
T. Kettle launching soon in 45 former DavidsTea locations
Putman has a track record of turning around retail chains in sectors others think are doomed.
In 2014, he purchased music store chain Sunrise Records.
In 2017, he bought up the leases of 70 HMV locations across Canada when that chain went bust and converted them to Sunrise locations.
In 2019, he bought the HMV chain in its home market of Great Britain, and while several locations were closed, nearly 100 are still in operation.
Then late last year he spent $10 million US to buy For Your Entertainment, a music, film and pop culture outlet that operates across the U.S.
Now he seems to be trying the same thing in the hot drink market.
"Everyone asked why would I buy a record chain as well, [but] we've always done well with the contrarian view so we're sticking with that," he said.
"It's definitely a tough time but there's always opportunity in the tough times if you can see it."
Putman says the chain will specialize in certified vegan, kosher and organic blends, and has an ethically sourced and sustainable supply chain.
Food industry consultant Robert Carter with StratonHunter says the plan is a "bold move" considering how niche the tea industry is.
Canada is predominantly a coffee-drinking culture, with more than three billion cups consumed per year.
Tea, meanwhile, is only about 500 million cups a year.
"It's going to be a challenge for sure," he said, adding that sales in the food category overall are only at about two-thirds of what they were before.
Carter says he assumes the rent on those locations must be extraordinarily advantageous. "His deals must be off-the-chart sweetheart deals," he said.
Retail consultant Farla Efros, president of HRC Advisory, says while restaurants and retail are still hurting, sales of hot drinks such as coffee and tea are faring comparatively better because they are seen as badly needed escape from consumers wary of being locked up at home.
"People want to support local," she said in an interview. "So people are still going out to coffee shops and get some air and clear their heads."
Although she had no inside knowledge of the financial terms of the deal between Putman and his landlords, she suspects the endeavour is probably fairly low risk for him.
"He's probably getting the real estate for dirt cheap, landlords are desperate at this point," she said, adding that she would not be surprised if the rent on the locations is something like a percentage of sales.
And taking over former tea shops is smart because the infrastructure is likely already in place. "He just needs to paint the sign and turn the lights on," she said.
"He's such an idea generator, and if anyone can do it he can do it," Efros said.
Tea is an actually leaf....what these guys sell are flowers soaked in hot water... Not tea.
Jun. 28, 2024 "After quietly closing stores, Rooms + Spaces merchandise creeping into Toys 'R' Us": Today I found this article by Tara Deschamps on BNN Bloomberg:
Only a few steps into a Toys “R” Us store just north of Toronto, it’s obvious something is up at the childhood mecca.
Stacks of beer and whisky glasses sit alongside Beatles records and band T-shirts in the entrance way of the Vaughan Mills mall location one June weekend. Roam the rest of the store and among the rows of toys, there are now aisles dedicated to pillows and beauty products and an entire department for kitchen and home decor.
Most of the items bear fluorescent signs advertising 40 per cent off products labelled as being from Rooms + Spaces, the home goods retailer Toys “R” Us Canada's owner Putman Investments opened in the throes of the COVID-19 pandemic.
What happened to the chain, which appears to have shrunk from 24 stores to two in roughly a year, is a mystery.
Rooms + Spaces declined to comment for this story.
Retail experts, however, say Rooms + Spaces' retrenchment from standalone locations to its appearance at Toys "R" Us is the likely product of
shifting consumer habits amid high inflation,
sluggish home sales
and competition from several old and new retailers in the same segment of the market.
"The retail landscape in general is struggling.
Consumers either have less money
or they're just spending less so that's an issue,"
said Joanne McNeish, an associate professor at Toronto Metropolitan University specializing in marketing.
"The second part is the household furniture landscape.
So many people bought things in COVID because they were in their homes and ... they're not purchasing things now for their homes.
People are spending money on travel; they're spending money on experiences."
And when they are shopping for housewares, there are no shortage of places to look. Stalwarts like
Ikea,
Hudson's Bay,
Walmart
and Canadian Tire
feature in most Canadian markets alongside new entrants like Fox Home.
Dollarama
and Loblaw
also keep expanding their merchandise ranges.
"It's a category that's really struggled to become a destination of all things," said Grant Packard, associate professor of marketing at York University.
"There's a spatula here, there's a floor lamp there and it's just kind of odds and sods (across many stores)."
Ont.-based Putman Investments is a relatively new player in the world of housewares but no stranger to retail.
Owner Doug Putman, whose steelworker father Bob started Everest Toys in the 1990s, purchased
Sunrise Records in 2014,
HMV in 2019
and Toys "R" Us Canada in 2021.
He bought 45 DavidsTea locations
when the company filed for bankruptcy protection in 2020 and turned them into a chain of tea shops called T. Kettle, which now lists just two locations on its website.
His journey in housewares began in May last year, when he revealed a plan to snap up 21 properties left vacant through Bed Bath & Beyond and BuyBuy Baby's recent bankruptcy and turn them into a new concept, Rooms + Spaces.
An August press release announcing grand openings for many of the Rooms + Spaces locations bumped the chain's expected store count to 24.
Many of those stores appear to have opened, but in the months since, Rooms + Spaces has only retracted.
Customers report frequent emails offering significant markdowns and social media is rife with chatter about stores that disappeared within months.
Vancouver media reported the company had to vacate its West Broadway location in December, when legal notices posted on its door noted it had defaulted on its lease.
Sometime after, Rooms + Spaces merchandise started cropping up at Toys "R" Us Canada,
where Putman has also recently added departments selling books, music, DVDs and other merchandise from HMV.
Some feel the emergence of Rooms + Spaces products in Toys "R" Us is both an admission of
just how bleak the current retail landscape
and a brilliant idea.
"Whenever you put two stores together, it increases store traffic for both," McNeish said.
Those with kids are likely drawn into Toys "R" Us to purchase dolls, Lego and games but then discover the store also has all the housewares they need with young ones around.
The same aha moment likely happens every time a grandparent, aunt or uncle visits in search of a gift.
"It creates now something else they might go there for," McNeish said, guessing that Putman's goal might be to create a retailer that's more akin to a department store.
Rooms + Spaces is not the only one applying that logic. Over its history, Indigo Books & Music Inc. has expanded heavily into the toy category and added housewares, Packard pointed out, who once worked for the retailer.
He thinks Rooms + Spaces' efforts "may work even better than Indigo because the lifestyle of the young family is a broader demographic than the lifestyle of the culture lover or the book lover."
But taking advantage of those synergies and salvaging the business will take a lot of work because Packard so far feels home furnishings have wound up to be "a little bit beyond" Putman's core of toys and pop culture merchandise.
Even if Rooms + Spaces doesn't last, Packard said Putman's retail prowess might not be thrown into question as much as some might expect.
"In retail businesses, the failure rate is incredibly high," he said.
"If he bought 10 businesses and seven of them failed, he's successful."
This report by The Canadian Press was first published June 28, 2024.
My opinion: I have never heard of Fox Homes before. They're only in Ontario.
https://foxhome.ca/pages/our-stores
I checked out Room + Spaces in West Edmonton Mall. This was average.
"Iconic retailer Reitmans looks to the next generation after emerging from bankruptcy protection"/ "Bed Bath & Beyond Canada's store closures are one of the largest recent retail failures: Analyst"
"Nordstrom followed a familiar path to failure: too big, too fast — and not Canadian enough"/ "Canadian retailer Simons is expanding. Can it succeed where its peers couldn't?"
During the company's second quarter earnings call on Thursday morning, Loblaw executives fielded questions from analysts about the grocery giant's soft food retail sales — and whether a boycott organized online had impacted the company's profits at all.
Some Canadians have been boycotting Loblaw since May, after the moderators of an online Reddit group called r/loblawsisoutofcontrol began encouraging its then-45,000 members to stop shopping at the store and its subsidiary brands.
During the company call, neither CEO Per Bank nor chief financial officer Richard Dufresne used the word boycott. But they didn't deny that it was a factor in food retail sales that "came in a little soft" compared to the same time last year.
'A bit of an impact' in certain stores in specific markets
Asking directly about an unexpected weakness in food retail numbers, one RBC analyst noted that while inflation and multi-buy pricing were factors, "there was also the boycott."
She asked where the company was seeing gains and where it was seeing "pressure."
Dufresne spent part of his answer to the analyst saying that several factors impacted sales, contrasting last May's hot weather — which he said helped garden and suncare sales — with the rainy and cold weather during May this year (the same categories that suffered, he said).
He then said, "regarding what you just mentioned in the last part of your question," that the company noticed "a bit of an impact" in certain stores in specific markets. He said that things had returned to normal by the end of the quarter.
Loblaw Cos. Ltd. and its parent company George Weston Ltd. say they have agreed to pay $500 million to settle a class-action lawsuit regarding their involvement in a bread price-fixing scheme.
The class-action case was brought against a group of companies that includes Loblaw and the Weston companies, Metro, Walmart Canada, Giant Tiger, and Sobeys and its owner, Empire Co. Ltd.
The plaintiffs allege those companies participated in a 14-year industry-wide price-fixing conspiracy between 2001 and 2015, leading to an artificial increase in packaged bread prices.
George Weston will pay $247.5 million in cash, while Loblaw will pay $252.5 million, made up of $156.5 million in cash and credit for $96 million previously paid to customers by Loblaw under the Loblaw Card program.
Loblaw chair Galen Weston, who is also chair and chief executive of George Weston, apologized on behalf of the companies.
"This behaviour should never have happened," said Weston. "We have the privilege of serving Canadians from coast to coast. That privilege needs to be earned each and every day. Reaching a settlement on this matter was the right thing to do in response to previous behaviour that did not meet our values and ethical standards."
He had different color handkerchiefs and they change color.
A rope was cut and put together, and a knot removed.
An Asian man in the audience volunteers. A handkerchief appears out of his wallet.
The Asian man writes his name on the $20 bill.
This Asian woman, whom I assume is the Asian man’s partner was on stage and holding a whole lemon.
Ron cuts open the lemon and the $20 bill with his name on it appears in the lemon.
I saw that in Jay Flair’s magic show at K- Days last year.
He then pulls out 3 donuts.
They show the bag is empty.
I then walked a bit outside and bought a burger for $8. It was good and filling.
There are some burgers that are like $14.
Superdogs show: I went to the Expo Arena and watched this from 2-2:30 pm. I have watched this show for the last 2 years.
The different kinds of dogs can do tricks like stand on the owner’s back and walk on their hind legs.
Shopping: I was shopping for 2 hrs. I was looking at all this:
Art: paintings, photography
Jewelry
Bags
Shiatsu Foldable Massage Chair- $400
It feel really good on my bag and neck. There is a back massage pad for $120.
Innovation Zone: I looked a bit into this part, but that was mainly about STEM.
The Indigenous Experience: I was shopping there.
I went outside and it was very hot like 30 degrees.
I checked out the Dairy Farmer’s booth and they gave this small free milkshake in a sample cup. I ordered the caramel crunch. It was really sweet with the vanilla ice cream.
I see that Tim Horton’s had a food truck and there was a huge line up.
Norwegian Cruise Line: I went to this booth. This man in his 70s was there.
He said I can enter to win a free cruise if I buy raffle tickets from Autism Edmonton which is the booth beside them.
I picked up a brochure and a well- produced cruising guide.
Autism
https://www.autismedmonton.org/
Flying Bob: This is from 6:30-7pm at the Discovery Stage.
He is juggling hats and 3-5 balls.
He can shoot ping pong balls from his mouth into the air.
He can juggle pins.
He can ride a bike with a big wheel at the front and the little wheel in the back.
He can ride a 7 foot unicycle and juggle pins.
Perogies: I hadn’t had perogies in years. I ordered the taco style which is like ground beef, tomatoes, lettuce, salsa, and sour cream.
It was $16.90, and with GST would be $17.75.
I hardly ever eat take out food.
Do you notice I’m always buying chips and cookies and I carry them around as a snack? I avoid eating takeout.
Jo Jo’s Magic Circus: This is from 7:30- 8:15 pm. On his website his name is Jordan Sabo. He also has kids volunteer.
He can make balls appear out of nowhere and make then increase in size.
He can juggle pins and balls.
He can also juggle a small plunger, a rubber chicken, and a pin at the same time.
https://pinwheelproductions.ca/about
Mon. Jul. 22, 2024: I went to K-Days and was there like the whole day. I still want to go there again. Usually 1 day is enough for me.
