Best Buy Expands Private Label Brands†

Wall Street Journal, April 27, 2009 — Best Buy Co. is rapidly expanding its private-label electronics business in a gamble to gain a key competitive advantage over rivals such as Wal-Mart Stores Inc. and Amazon.com Inc.

Best Buy believes it can prosper in private-label electronics — an area that has historically flummoxed U.S. retailers — by using the mountains of customer feedback it collects from its stores to make simple innovations to established electronic gadgetry. The move comes as Best Buy's position in the consumer electronics market has strengthened in the past year following the liquidation of former rival Circuit City Stores Inc.