Stephan's Friday Picks

• Anthony Bourdain's wild summers still echo in Provincetown (NYT)
• RIP Tony, you would have hated all this discourse (Bon Appetit)
• Amazon to expand drone delivery to 500 locales (WSJ)
• The meal kit industry is in disarray after a major supplier went bust (WSJ)
• Conde Nast CEO explains why Gourmet and not Bon Ap (Eater)

 Stephan's Tuesday Picks

• Roger Martin: Who should do strategy (Medium)
• Sycamore to take apparel retailer Chico's FAS private for nearly $1 billion (Reuters)
• What is a 'moat' (NYT)
• Meal kit maker Blue Apron to be sold (WSJ)
• Amazon has become a one-click nightmare (The Atlantic)

 Stephan's Tuesday Picks

• Strategy as problem-solving (Medium)
• Nestle buys U.S. meal delivery group Freshly (Reuters)
• New online bookshop unites indies to rival Amazon (The Guardian)
• France to close supermarket bookshelves to quell shopkeeper ire (Bloomberg)
• Turning private labels into powerhouse brands (McKinsey)

 Stephan's Tuesday Picks

• The Canadian consumer: Too big to fail (BCG)
• There's a reason parents miss back-to-school shopping (The Atlantic)
• Blue Apron's CEO talks about meal-kit company's Coronavirus revival (Bloomberg)
• Nestle moves further into health, buying peanut allergy treatment maker (WSJ)
• Convenience stores turn to home delivery to fight pandemic slump (Bloomberg)

Stephan's Monday Picks

• FreshDirect stages a comeback (NYT)
• The gas station M&A frenzy looks like a bubble (Bloomberg)
• The robot in aisle five isn't stalking you (WSJ)
• What happens to your mail-order mattress after you return it (538)
• The U.S.-Iran pistachio war is heating up (Businessweek)

Stephan's Friday Picks

• The weirdest subway restaurant in America (WSJ)
• Softbank's $375 million bet on pizza went really bad, really fast (Bloomberg)
• Costco capitalism (Bryan Lehrer)
• Blue Apron eyes options including a sale (WSJ)
• From the archives (1955): The barnum of the supermarkets (Macleans)

Stephan's Monday Picks

• Dunkaroos are back. Why? (NYT)
• Why grocery stores have tiny, kid-sized carts (The Atlantic)
• Meal kit makers jostle for a slice of Canada's growing, competitive industry (CBC)
• Financing the transformation in fashion (BCG)
• The new social contract in the 21st century (McKinsey)

Stephan's Friday Picks

• 'Amazon's Choice' isn't the endorsement it appears (WSJ)
• Hard times for a hot commodity, the hot chile of New Mexico (NYT)
• For Uber and Amazon, 2020 offers promising food delivery acquisitions (Bloomberg)
• HelloFresh grabs a bigger slice of shrinking meal kit business (WSJ)
• From the archives (2007): Sobeys buys Thrifty, gains foothold in B.C. (Globe and Mail)

Stephan's Thursday Picks

• What retail recovery? Malls under pressure as stores close (WSJ)
• Meal kits struggle to reach customers in supermarkets (Bloomberg)
• Walmart partners with subscription-based children's clothing startup Kidbox (Tech Crunch)
• The global diversity of french fry dips is a window into the way we eat today (Gastro Obscura)
• From the archives (2013): Canadian chocolate makers to pay $23.2 million fine in price-fixing lawsuit (Globe and Mail)

Stephan's Monday Picks

• Amazon to launch new grocery store business (WSJ)
• Is this the death rattle of mail-order meal kits (Eater)
• Perdue promotes Niman Ranch head in bid to gain premium shoppers (Bloomberg)
• Amazon discontinues its quirky Dash buttons (Engadget)
• Big birds are so 2017. The money is now in smaller, tender chicken (Bloomberg)

Stephan's Thursday Picks

• Mars Inc. CEO Grant Reid is thinking a hundred years ahead (Bloomberg)
• The Prime challenges for Amazon's new delivery robot (Wired)
• Another meal company folds its apron (WSJ)
• Tim Hortons parent shakes up executive ranks amid solid results (Financial Post)
• The retail industry is trying to understand tech (Bloomberg)

Stephan's Monday Picks

• Department store of the future: Selling art off the wall and car insurance at checkout (WSJ)
• Will Amazon finally kill New York (Longreads)
• Blue Apron links with dieters in comeback effort (WSJ)
• India curbs power of Amazon and Walmart and Walmart to sell products online (NYT)
• Literally every single food trend predicted to take over in 2019 (Eater)

Stephan's Monday Picks

• Geospatial analytics for omnichannel retail (McKinsey)
• The messy business of selling meal kits (WSJ)
• 350 million diners fuel battle for China's food delivery crown (Bloomberg)
• Gene-edited plants and animals are GM foods, EU court rules (The Guardian)
• Talking to your boss about data (MIT)

Stephan's Friday Picks

• Restaurants must embrace food delivery, and fast (Bloomberg)
• The demise of Toys 'R' Us is a warning (The Atlantic)
• Walmart may launch a video streaming service to battle Netflix, Amazon (Ars Technica)
• Inside Fresh Direct's big bet to win the food delivery fight (WSJ)
• From the archives (2007): Weston civilization (The Globe and Mail)

Stephan's Thursday Picks

• Chef'd meal kit maker suspending business (WSJ)
• Fresh Direct prepares to battle Amazon and Walmart with new fulfillment centre (Food Dive)
• Cloudy with a chance of IKEA meatballs (Eater)
• There's a reason you're drinking so much Aperol spritz (NYT)
• The false tale of Amazon's industry-conquering juggernaut (Wired)

Stephan's Wednesday Picks

• Meet the 'million-dollar palate' behind a flood of new foods (NYT)
• Agile to the rescue in consumer goods (BCG)
• Home Depot sets $1.2 billion supply chain overhaul (WSJ)
• Speed and precision as the new supply chain drivers (McKinsey)
• Why meal kits are moving offline (Eater)

Stephan's Monday Picks

• How e-commerce with drone delivery is taking off in China (The Economist)
• A year after Amazon devours Whole Foods, rivals are pursuing countermoves (WSJ)
• America's largest private company reboots a 153-year old strategy (Bloomberg)
• HelloFresh jumps on bandwagon to sell meat kits in grocery stores (The Spoon)
• Why the frozen food aisle is hot right now (WSJ)

Stephan's Tuesday Picks

• Alibaba made a driverless robot that runs 9mph to deliver packages (The Verve)
• Our food supply chain is killing us (The Outline)
• Walmart's war on waste (Canadian Grocer)
• HelloFresh to sell meal kits in Giant Food, Stop & Shop stores (WSJ)
• UK march of discounters Aldi and Lidl abating, say analysts (FT)

Stephan's Friday Picks

• How the math men overthrew the mad men (The New Yorker)
• Has wine gone bad (The Guardian)
• Kroger buys meal kit company Home Chef in latest online acquisition (WSJ)
• Walmart has quietly launched Jetblack, a 'members-only' personal shopping service for affluent city moms (Recode)
• From the archives (2007): How successful leaders think (HBR)

Stephan's Tuesday Picks

• Simons opens its doors to outside investors for bigger push into e-commerce (Globe and Mail)
• The death of the "Big Food" era is imminent after the industry's biggest lobbying group crumbles (Quartz)
• Former Starbucks chief to help fuse Albertsons, Rite Aid aid (WSJ)
• Meal kits come to Walmart stores and online grocery service (Tech Crunch)
• KFC's big screw up left restaurants without chicken (Bloomberg)