Best Buy recently removed e-mail support from its web site, a move the company said was designed to improve response and to give customers the kind of interactions they seek. The problem with this change is twofold.

The International Council of Shopping Centers (ICSC) and the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania, have partnered once again to bring the retail real estate industry The University of Shopping Centers, on the campus of the Wharton School, March 4-6, 2013, in Philadelphia. The program will feature three new learning tracks, including the Executive track, taught by Wharton professors.

A growing chorus of economists, engineers and business leaders are warning that the evisceration of the manufacturing work force over the last 30 years might not have scarred just Detroit and the Rust Belt. It might have dimmed the country's capacity to innovate and stunted the prospects for long-term growth.

Eager holiday shoppers helped drive retail sales upwards in November, helping boost sales in the first half of the holiday season. According to the National Retail Federation, the world's largest retail trade association, November retail sales (excluding automobiles, gas stations and restaurants) increased 0.8 percent seasonally adjusted from October and increased 4.4 percent unadjusted year-over-year. With this news, NRF is still expecting holiday sales to grow 4.1 percent over last holiday season.

If you're looking for more evidence of the bipolar nature of mobile shoppers, look no further. The Harris Poll people have what you need. In what should be called the NIMBY (Not In My Backyard) effect, some 66 percent of Americans polled said they expect mobile payments to eventually replace payment cards and even cash-but not their cards and cash.