Stephan's Tuesday Picks

• Struggling movie theaters go upscale to survive (WSJ)
• China's SenseTime valued at $4.5 billion after Alibaba-led funding (Reuters)
• Fashion forward: Asos has ambitions for big expansion (The Guardian)
• Canadian Tire expands loyalty program to cover more retail brands (Financial Post)
• Kroger officially has a chain of restaurants (Food & Wine)

Stephan's Monday Picks

• Walmart's future workforce: Robots and freelancers (The Atlantic)
• Why aren't mothers worth anything to venture capitalists (The New Yorker)
• Sporting Life is on a growth tear in a crowded retail space (Globe and Mail)
• Is your CEO irreplaceable (Stanford GSB)
• For candy fans, the only thing worse than Necco wafers is no Necco wafers (WSJ)

Stephan's Friday Picks

• Walmart opens first small high-tech supermarket in China (Reuters)
• Smucker to buy Rachael Ray dog food brand in $1.9 billion deal (Bloomberg)
• Tim Hortons slides from 4th to 50th in brand reputation survey (Globe and Mail)
• U.K. retailers post worst sales slump since financial crisis (Bloomberg)
• From the archives (1970): The social responsibility of business is to increase profits (New York Times Magazine)

Stephan's Thursday Picks

• How organic wine finally caught on (HBR)
• The organizational agenda in consumer packaged goods (McKinsey)
• Sweetgreen's tech-driven menu shakes up the fast casual food war (Bloomberg)
• Rules of engagement: How cities are courting Amazon's new headquarters (WSJ)
• La Colombe hires Moelis in bid for $1 billion valuation (Bloomberg)

Stephan's Wednesday Picks

• Noodle on this: Machine learning that can identify ramen by shop (Google)
• WD-40 does $380 million in sales a year. It's secret sauce is surprisingly simple (Inc)
• Retailers race against Amazon to automate stores (NYT)
• Walmart is in takeover talks with pharmacy startup (Bloomberg)
• 'Craft' beer turns out to be a big business (WSJ)

Stephan's Tuesday Picks

• One in three families can't afford diapers. Why are they so expensive (Tampa Bay Times)
• Crispr'd food, coming a supermarket near you (Wired)
• When retail workers have stable schedules, sales and productivity go up (HBR)
• Saks, Lord &Taylor hit with data breach (WSJ)
• Alibaba takes control of Ele.me, at $9.5 billion value (Bloomberg)

Stephan's Monday Picks

• Walmart in talks to strengthen ties with health insurer Humana (NYT)
• Dollarama plans Montreal expansion, stock split as profit climbs (Globe and Mail)
• Five years after tragedy, big retailers say Bangladesh factories aren't safe enough (WSJ)
• One of the world's biggest companies found the secret to better meetings: A wooden box (Quartz)
• Tim Hortons wants to give its restaurants a $700M makeover. But franchisees say it's 'ill conceived' (Financial Post)