More than 115 cases of eye damage reported in Ontario after solar eclipse
More than 115 people who viewed the solar eclipse in Ontario earlier this month experienced eye damage after the event, according to eye doctors in the province.
Canadian department store Zellers hopes to make a comeback next year, a decade after the discount chain shuttered most of its locations., brand owner Hudson's Bay Co. said Wednesday.
Zellers will debut a new e-commerce website and expand its brick-and-mortar footprint within select Hudson's Bay department stores across the country in early 2023, HBC said.
The relaunched discount retailer will offer "a digital-first shopping journey that taps into the nostalgia of the brand," the company said.
"We know how special Zellers is in the hearts and minds of people in Canada," said Adam Powell, Zellers' chief business officer. "Zellers is a brand deeply rooted in the Canadian experience."
The return of Zellers comes as soaring inflation drives consumers to discount retailers in search of lower prices and fierce competition from existing stores like Walmart, Dollarama and Giant Tiger.
Reviving the brand when people are looking for ways to save money could help Zellers capture market share in part through "the illusion of more competition," said Vass Bednar, executive director of the Master of Public Policy in Digital Society at McMaster University.
"We're in this inflationary period and people are more price conscious than ever before," she said. "Shoppers who remember the Zellers brand will associate it with saving money."
The planned resurrection of Zellers also comes amid an ongoing lawsuit over a Quebec family's use of the Zellers brand.
The Moniz family is behind various recent trademark applications and corporate registries, including Zellers Inc., Zellers Convenience Store Inc. and Zellers Restaurant Inc.
In a statement of claim filed last fall, HBC accused the Moniz family of trademark infringement, depreciation of goodwill and so-called passing off -- the deceptive marketing or misrepresentation of goods.
Retail analyst Bruce Winder said the reintroduction of Zellers likely stems in part from the lawsuit.
"It's most likely related to the legal issue with the trademarks," he said. "For Zellers to really say, 'This is ours,' they have to show that they're using it."
Zellers will face an uphill battle from entrenched competitors in the discount retail marketplace, he said.
"It could be a niche opportunity and I hope it works, but I just don't see it coming back successfully en masse."
The Zellers department store was founded in 1931 and acquired by HBC in 1978.
It operated as the discount division of its flagship Hudson's Bay department stores, with the slogan "Where the lowest price is the law."
The store hit its peak of about 350 locations in the late 1990s before losing ground to big box competitors such as Walmart.
In 2011, HBC announced plans to sell the majority of its remaining Zellers leases to Target Corp., closing most stores by 2013.
The retailer kept a handful of Zellers locations open as liquidation outlets until 2020.
The company recently launched pop-up Zellers shops inside Hudson's Bay department stores in Burlington, Ont. and Anjou, Que.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Aug. 17, 2022.
----
What are your memories of Zellers? Share your nostalgia by emailing us at dotcom@bellmedia.ca, and include your name and location. Your comments may be used in a CTVNews.ca story.
More than 115 people who viewed the solar eclipse in Ontario earlier this month experienced eye damage after the event, according to eye doctors in the province.
A Sherwood Park family says their new house is uninhabitable. The McNaughton's say they were forced to leave the house after living there for only a week because contaminants inside made it difficult to breathe.
A man has been handed a lengthy hunting ban and fined thousands of dollars for illegally killing a grizzly bear, B.C. conservation officers say.
The B.C. NDP has asked the federal government to recriminalize public drug use, marking a major shift in the province's approach to addressing the deadly overdose crisis.
The Ontario Provincial Police (OPP) says it's investigating an interaction between a uniformed officer and anti-Trudeau government protestors after a video circulated on social media.
An emergency slide fell off a Delta Air Lines jetliner shortly after takeoff Friday from New York, and pilots who felt a vibration in the plane circled back to land safely at JFK Airport.
Sophie Gregoire Trudeau says there is 'still so much love' between her and Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, as they navigate their post-separation relationship co-parenting their three children.
George Mallory is renowned for being one of the first British mountaineers to attempt to scale the dizzying heights of Mount Everest during the 1920s. Nearly a century later, newly digitized letters shed light on Mallory’s hopes and fears about ascending Everest.
A loud explosion was heard across Hamilton on Friday after a propane tank was accidentally destroyed and detonated at a local scrap metal yard, police say.
As if a 4-0 Edmonton Oilers lead in Game 1 of their playoff series with the Los Angeles Kings wasn't good enough, what was announced at Rogers Place during the next TV timeout nearly blew the roof off the downtown arena.
Mounties in Nanaimo, B.C., say two late-night revellers are lucky their allegedly drunken antics weren't reported to police after security cameras captured the men trying to steal a heavy sign from a downtown business.
A property tax bill is perplexing a small townhouse community in Fergus, Ont.
When identical twin sisters Kim and Michelle Krezonoski were invited to compete against some of the world’s most elite female runners at last week’s Boston Marathon, they were in disbelief.
The giant stone statues guarding the Lions Gate Bridge have been dressed in custom Vancouver Canucks jerseys as the NHL playoffs get underway.
A local Oilers fan is hoping to see his team cut through the postseason, so he can cut his hair.
A family from Laval, Que. is looking for answers... and their father's body. He died on vacation in Cuba and authorities sent someone else's body back to Canada.
A former educational assistant is calling attention to the rising violence in Alberta's classrooms.
The federal government says its plan to increase taxes on capital gains is aimed at wealthy Canadians to achieve “tax fairness.”