Mom Accuses Walmart of Going After Girl Scouts†

Says Retailer Rolls Out Private-Label 'Fake' Thin Mints, Tagalongs

Advertising Age, August 3, 2009 — Walmart, which has been going after a lot of brands lately with the restage and expansion of its Great Value private label, now appears to be taking on the Girl Scouts.

Organic Foods Get on Private-Label Wagon†

As More Shoppers Pinch Pennies, Grocery Chains See 'Natural' Expansion of Store Brands

Wall Street Journal, July 27, 2009 — Organic farmers and grocery retailers are embracing the idea of lower-cost, private-label products to retain newly budget-conscious consumers.

Supervalu Inc., the fourth-largest U.S. food retailer by sales, expanded its Wild Harvest organic brand to 312 items, from 150 last spring. Safeway Inc., the third-largest U.S. food retailer , last fall began selling its organic food brands to other retailers.

Private-label organics have "broken some price barriers for shoppers, and everyone is price sensitive these days," said Mike Gilliland, chief executive of Newflower Market Inc., a natural-grocery chain based in Boulder, Colo., with 25 stores.

Best Buy's Own Brands Gaining Steam

Investors.com, May 26, 2009 — Best Buy (BBY) store shelves hold consumer electronics products from Panasonic (PC), Samsung and Sony (SNE)— and Dynex, Insignia and Rocketfish.

Those latter three names are lesser-known but close to the heart of Best Buy and increasingly popular with shoppers. They are private-label brands owned by Best Buy, the nation's No. 1 consumer electronics chain. Best Buy has seen sales of its exclusive store brands rise rapidly thanks to low prices and innovative designs.

Safeway Cultivates Its Private Labels as Brands to Be Sold By Other Chains†

Wall Street Journal, May 7, 2009 — Safeway Inc. has reached deals to expand the outside presence of two of its house brands, selling them through other retailers, both overseas and domestically, an unusual approach for private-label goods.

Safeway, the fourth-largest U.S. food retailer by sales, has said it wants to market O Organics and Eating Right to other supermarket chains and to aggressively advertise the lines.

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.

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.

Don't Blame Private-Label Gains on the Recession†

No-Names Brands Have Been Picking up Momentum for Past Decade Across Demographics

Advertising Age, April 21, 2009 — Private label growth didn't start gaining momentum in the downturn.

Not only have private label brands been gaining share for the past decade, experts say these gains are the single-biggest problem facing branded packaged goods players. House brands, once a staple of lower-income households, now enjoy roughly equal penetration among demographic segments. Improvements in quality and packaging have helped removed the stigma attached to buying a no-name product.

Study: Cutting Spending Hurts Brands Long Term†

Following Boom/Bust Cycle Flirts With Danger

Advertising Age, April 6, 2009 — Household and personal care might once have seemed recession-resistant, but last year U.S.-based personal-care marketers actually cut ad spending faster than the general market. That could be potentially damaging for their brands, according to one study that shows that marketers that cut spending during a downturn lost share to private labels — share they didn't regain.

Store Brands Squeeze Big Food Firms†

After Profiting From Higher Prices, ConAgra and Other Makers Are Rethinking Strategy as Volume Falls

Wall Street Journal, March 27, 2009 — The slumping economy has begun to squeeze big food makers, forcing them to rethink their pricing strategies.

After a year in which they boosted prices to help offset higher costs for transportation and commodities such as corn, food companies are finding that consumers are increasingly trading down to cheaper "private label," or store-branded, food.

That's making it harder to continue raising prices.

Wal-Mart Gives Its Store Brand a Makeover

Wal-Mart is changing the formula for many of its Great Value products, adding new items and rolling out updated packaging

BusinessWeek, March 16, 2009 — Wal-Mart Stores (WMT) has completely overhauled its oldest and biggest store brand, a move likely to send shock waves through the ranks of branded grocery manufacturers around the globe.