Just in time for the holiday shopping season, four major retailers have been sued for tricking shoppers with fake "sales." JCPenney, Sears, Macy's, and Kohl's were all hit with lawsuits this week by the Los Angeles city attorney's office over an alleged "false reference pricing scheme" that misled customers into thinking they were scoring big discounts. But the advertised "original," "list," and "regular" prices were never actually charged, according to the suits.

Bucking the trend in recent years of Black Friday shopping encroaching into Thanksgiving, the nation’s biggest mall has decided not to open on the holiday this year. The Mall of America notified its employees and tenants Wednesday morning that it will close the mall — including Nickelodeon Universe and even its movie theaters — on Thanksgiving Day for the first time. Its 520-plus stores will have the option to open on the holiday, but mall executives expect that most will decide to remain closed.

Trying to cut its way to profitability, troubled Sears Holdings announced Thursday that it will close 68 Kmart and 10 Sears stores this summer in its latest move to cut losses. Sears' (SHLD) move (see the list of the stores) comes atop a previous announcement that it will close 50 other stores. Sales have been falling and Sears had a disappointing holiday sales season.

On the high streets of small towns, the success stories are Primark, Greggs, Wilko, Poundland and variety shops like Tiger. Card and gift emporiums are ubiquitous. In this unpropitious climate, Waterstones is holding out with almost 300 shops, recovering – according to the figures – from near failure four years ago. By Alice Spawls. (Apr. 6)

“That’s the Dillard’s dead zone. Nothing can survive over there.” By Mike Nagel, (Nov. ’14)

Sears doesn't want to waste any time. The retailer announced on Tuesday that it planned to "accelerate" the closing of at least 50 "unprofitable stores." Sears (SHLD), which also owns Kmart, originally planned to close the stores over the next few months, but poor sales have sped up the timeline. In its earnings report Tuesday, Sears said it expects total revenue to hit $7.3 billion for the fourth quarter -- down from $8.1 billion last year.

Changing consumer sentiment and over distribution of product has hit the department store model hard in the challenging US market. Can executives win back the magic through a series of ambitious new year initiatives? By Lauren Sherman. (Jan. 3)

A look at how SkuVault can help with your delivery and inventory issues to help resolve customer complaints for online retail.

New York area retail vets Ronny Shmoel and Albert Liniado are betting that the third time will be a

Wal-Mart Stores Inc. plans to close 269 stores, including its experimental small-format Express outlets, in a push to streamline the chain that will eliminate 16,000 jobs.

Ex-American Apparel Inc. Chief Executive Officer Dov Charney lives in a Los Angeles mansion with eight bedrooms, but says he can’t scrape together enough cash to keep paying a lawyer. Charney is now representing himself in a lawsuit by the hedge fund Standard General, a backer of American Apparel. The 46-year-old told a Delaware judge that if he can’t raise money to hire a new lawyer, he’ll continue doing his own legal work.

Amazon's CEO says he doesn't measure drone delivery's arrival in months. He does say, though, that he expects the service to be ubiquitous.

Shares of J.C.

New SEC rules to force companies to disclose CEO pay relative to workers. It's a big gap

After grabbing a stake in Keurig earlier in the year, Coca-Cola has secured a 16.7% equity stake in energy giant Monster.

Oxfam International has made a graphic showing how a handful of corporations control nearly everything we buy at the grocery store. The graphic focuses on 10 of the world's most powerful food and beverage companies: Coca-Cola, PepsiCo, Unilever, Danone, Mars, Mondelez International, Kellogg's, General Mills, Nestle, and Associated British Foods.

Hudson's Bay Co. says it will pay $2.9 billion US to acquire U.S. luxury retailer Saks Inc. in a friendly deal.