Kohl's is getting Black Friday started on Thanksgiving Day.
The department store will be open starting at 5 p.m. local time on Thanksgiving Day, offering Black Friday deals until 1 p.m. the next day.
These deals kick off online at 12:01 a.m. CT and run until 3 p.m. the next day.
To get customers in the mood, it will also be offering a limited selection of deals in stores and online on November 1.
Retailers have come under fire in recent years for kicking off their Black Friday sales on Thanksgiving. As a result, several have started to buck the trend and stay closed.
Earlier this month, Business Insider reported that at least 60 retailers including Costco, Home Depot, and TJ Maxx had confirmed they would remain closed on Thanksgiving. Phillip Dengler, head of editorial and content marketing for BestBlackFriday.com, told USA Today that this was the most confirmed closures it has had at this point in the year compared to previous years.
While some retailers are still hoping to capitalize on Black Friday sales early by opening during Thanksgiving, some have likely pulled back because the famous shopping day doesn't carry the same weight it once did. This is partly because consumers are increasingly shopping for deals online, which means they don't need to waste time lining up in stores for one big day of shopping. They are also used to having deals year-round, which takes pressure off of the day.
An online petition is calling for the street in front of the Saudi Embassy in Washington, DC, to be renamed "Jamal Khashoggi Way," in honor of the murdered dissident, according to The Washington Post.
Khashoggi was the Saudi Arabian reporter who was killed inside the Saudi Consulate in Istanbul, Turkey, last month.
Khashoggi had been an outspoken opponent of Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, who has repeatedly denied playing a part in Khashoggi's killing despite having ties to the Saudi hit squad that allegedly strangled, then dismembered the writer.
The petition has collected over 1,500 signatures as of Wednesday evening and was created by DC residents who are hoping mayor Muriel Bowser will agree, so that Saudi officials won't easily forget that harming journalists is not tolerated in DC, the New York Daily News reported Wednesday.
Regulations in the district require that a person be deceased for at least two years before they can receive such an honor, but the petition is asking Bowser to make an exception.
Read more: Here's everything we know about the troubling disappearance and death of Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi
Council on American-Islamic Relations director Hihad Awad applauded the idea, telling the Daily News that the thought of Saudi Embassy workers having to put "Jamal Khashoggi Way" on their business cards is powerful.
"Imagine if their mail had to be addressed to Khashoggi Way?" Awad told the publication.
The Saudi government has changed its story about Khashoggi's death several times, but appeared to admit on October 25 that his killing was premeditated.
Khashoggi was last seen entering the Saudi Consulate in Istanbul, Turkey, on October 2 after going there to collect marriage documents. He never returned.
It took the Saudi government more than two weeks to acknowledge that he had indeed died there.
Minnesota Timberwolves guard Derrick Rose shocked the NBA world by exploding for a career-high 50 points to help his short-handed team beat the Utah Jazz.
The performance came with the Wolves playing without Jimmy Butler and starting guard Jeff Teague, thrusting Rose, who had been playing a reserve role, into the spotlight.
Rose, who is playing on a one-year minimum contract with the Wolves, got hot, particularly in the fourth quarter, as he carried the Wolves down the stretch with 15 points in the final frame.
Rose looked like the vintage player who became the league's youngest MVP at 23, rocketing to the basket for a variety of tough finishes and even knocking down outside jumpers, never a strong point in his game.
Rose suffered a slew of knee injuries during his years when he was a perennial All-Star with the Chicago Bulls, then was traded to the New York Knicks in 2016 while he went through a civil rape trial (he was found not liable). He ended the season with another knee injury.
Rose told The Athletic's Shams Charania that he didn't have any contract offers going into the 2017-18 season before LeBron James and the Cleveland Cavaliers called him, offering a deal. Rose took the contract, but had an up-and-down year that included an extended absence away from the team to evaluate his future. He was eventually traded to the Utah Jazz, who cut him, then signed with the Wolves, where he provided some good minutes for former Bulls coach Tom Thibodeau. He re-signed with the team this past summer.
All of which is to say, Rose's NBA career seemed very much in doubt in recent years. After a stunning breakthrough game on Wednesday, Rose was emotional.
When the final buzzer sounded, his teammates mobbed him, as Rose fought back tears.
Then, during his postgame interview, Rose got choked up, saying he had "worked his ass off" to keep his career alive.
After the game, Thibodeau alluded to Rose's tough path back, saying it was the first summer in five years that Rose didn't have to go through rehab.
The NBA has already seen four 50-point games in less than a month. But at the onset of the season, few could have predicted that Rose, who was nearly out of the league at various points in recent years, would be a candidate to go for the rare achievement in the NBA.
It's big, it's bronze, and it's brand new. But the Statue of Unity, a landmark that stretches nearly 600 feet tall and weighs more than 2,000 tons, is dividing India.
The Guardian reports that 5,000 police shadowed massive crowds on Wednesday, as they converged on a distant corner of Gujarat state to see Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi finally introduce the world to its newly minted, tallest statue.
In an elaborate ceremony complete with fighter-jet flybys and rose petal-spraying helicopters, there was no sign of the protests that the four-year, 30 billion rupee ($405 million USD) monolith has attracted right up to its unveiling.
This particular corner of Gujarat state is home to largely tribal groups with historic ties to the land and a supposedly special protected status.
The chiefs of more than 20 local villages produced a letter asking Modi to stay away from the inauguration of the statue that rises twice as high as the US's Statue of Liberty.
But, hailing the 600-foot, bronze-laden recreation of independence legend Sardar Patel a "huge" symbol of Indian prowess, Modi declared the Statue of Unity his "answer to all those who question the existence of India."
Read more: A photographer spent years exploring India's apocalyptic 'capital of coal' and returned with unreal photos
The big bronze Iron Man of India
Patel was India's first interior minister and deputy prime minister. He earned the title the "Iron Man of India" after uniting feuding states and principalities to form the greater Indian state after shedding the yoke of colonial Britain.
During its drawn-out construction, the Statue of Unity has been a source of sharp division. Lambasted as a profound waste of money and a white elephant that has discarded locals on a whim. The BBC reports that farmers and tribal protesters were detained as recently as Tuesday as violence flared over what has been something of a pet project for the prime minister.
The notoriously heavy handed Gujarat government reportedly relocated some 185 families to make way for India's latest tourism mecca, compensating them with 1,200 acres (475 hectares) of new land.
Modi certainly hopes the more than 2,000-ton, astonishingly detailed rendering, remotely located 125 miles from the state capital, Ahmedabad, will become a nationalist pilgrimage for about 2.5 million visitors every year.
China will be noting that it's South Asian rival has now well and truly eclipsed Henan's Spring Temple Buddha ( 鲁山大佛 ) which, at 420 feet was previously the tallest statue in the world — and it did so by employing hundreds of Chinese laborers.
Traditional retailers have already lost billions of dollars worth of sales to online rivals such as Amazon.
Unfortunately for them, things may soon get worse.
Online stores are continuing to steal sales from their brick-and-mortar counterparts. The bad news for traditional retailers, is that e-tailers' market share gains are increasing, according to a new report from Morgan Stanley.
"We expect e-commerce to continue to accelerate," Morgan Stanley analysts Kimberly Greenberger, Brian Nowak, Simeon Gutman, Vincent Sinisi, and Lauren Cassel said in the report.
American consumers are likely to spend about $2.6 trillion on what Morgan Stanley calls "core" retail products, which excludes building materials, cars, gasoline, and those sold outside of actual stores. Of that amount, about 20% will be spent online, according to the report. That's up from about 18% last year and just 12% in 2014.
But e-commerce's share will be even higher next year, hitting 22.4% of retail sales, according to Morgan Stanley. Overall core retail sales are only expected to grow only about 1% next year, much slower than e-commerce is expected to grow. That means online retail's gains will largely come at the expense of brick-and-mortar stores.
Morgan Stanley
The pace is increasing
That's bad enough, but the bigger problem for brick-and-mortar retailers is that the pace at which online stores are gaining share in the retail market has been increasing in recent years.
Read more: Amazon has spooked its investors — these 4 charts show why its growth is slowing
Earlier this decade, e-commerce was gaining about one percentage point of market share each year. In 2013, for example, its share went up about 1.13 percentage points — or 113 basis points — to about 11% of retail sales. In 2014, it rose another 1.1 percentage points.
But in 2016, it gained about 2 percentage points of market share. This year, Morgan Stanley expects it to gain 2.3 percentage points and then to add another 2.4 percentage points next year.
Morgan Stanley
Perhaps most worrisome for retailers, e-commerce sales tend to spike in the fourth quarter. The holiday period tends to be the most important time of year for retailers, because it's when they typically see the lion's share of their sales. The fourth quarter can often be the key factor in whether a retailer posts a profit or a loss for the year.
Online sales saw a big boom in the fourth quarter last year. The portion of total core retail sales accounted for by e-commerce vendors jumped more than four percentage points. Because of that rise, e-commerce sales in the holiday period hit nearly 21% of core retail sales — more than three percentage points higher than they accounted for the whole year.
Morgan Stanley is expecting a similar rise this year, forecasting that online sales will account for 23.3% of core retail sales this holiday season.
Morgan Stanley
That could spell bad news for traditional retailers, many of which are heavily laden with debt, have closed slews of stores, and have already seen slowing sales.
Former Hollywood mogul Harvey Weinstein is accused of sexually assaulting a 16-year-old model in New York in 2002, according to a class-action lawsuit.
"He then took off his pants and forcibly held Jane Doe while taking her hand and making her touch and massage his penis," court documents said, according to multiple news outlets.
The anonymous woman, who at the time was an aspiring model and actress, reportedly moved to the US from Poland. The woman claimed she met Weinstein at an event, and then three days later, went to his apartment in the SoHo neighborhood of Manhattan for what she believed was a business lunch.
The woman claimed she informed Weinstein she was only 16-years-old before entering his apartment.
Weinstein allegedly promised he would acquire a role for the woman in a movie, but never delivered after she rejected his sexual advances, BuzzFeed News said, citing the complaint.
The court filing went on to allege that Weinstein "threatened and pressured" the woman. Weinstein allegedly also claimed "that he had 'made' the careers of Penelope Cruz and Gwyneth Paltrow, and that neither would be working without him."
Read more: Harvey Weinstein says he offered acting jobs 'in exchange for sex' in since-retracted interview
Weinstein was said to have obtained her a role as an extra in the "Nanny Diaries" in 2004, but had also "ensured she never received work" because she rejected his advances, according to court documents.
Ben Brafman, Weinstein's attorney, described the allegation as "preposterous" and "patently false."
The woman's claim is included in a growing class-action lawsuit in which at least 10 women claim that Weinstein attempted to "engage in unwanted sexual conduct."
"Plaintiffs and members of the [lawsuit] had or wanted to have careers or wanted to make deals in the entertainment industry and correctly understood that Weinstein was a powerful force in the entertainment production world," the class-action lawsuit said in June.
"At all times, Plaintiffs and the Class operated under duress and the credible and objective threat of being threatened or blacklisted by Weinstein and major film producers ... if they refused Weinstein's unwanted sexual advances or complained about his behavior," the lawsuit added.
The disgraced Miramax cofounder was indicted in July after a grand jury in New York voted to charge him with two counts of predatory assault, with each charge carrying a minimum 10-year sentence. Weinstein faces six charges that includes rape in the first and third degree.
"If you are a survivor of the predatory abuse with which Mr. Weinstein is charged, there is still time to pursue justice," Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus Vance Jr. said in July.
Beringea, which has backed men's clothing startup Thread and electric car charging firm Chargemaster, plans to raise up to £80 million ($100 million) in new capital by issuing new shares.
The investment firm runs two publicly listed funds in the UK, known as venture capital trusts (VCTs), which invest in fast-growing startups and which any investor can put money into. This is slightly different to traditional venture capital funds, which are closed to direct public investment and have limited lifecycles.
The firm plans to raise the funding from December for its two VCTs listed on the London Stock Exchange, adding to its current $700 million (£549 million) under management across the US and the UK.
Beringea managing partner Stuart Veale said the company had an initial target raise of £60 million ($77 million), but would consider another £20 million ($26 million) depending on demand.
Read more: A mysterious Chinese fund that promised £600 million to UK startups fired its CEO and there's no sign of the cash
Beringea's portfolio of startups includes Chargemaster, which provides charging points for electric cars and was acquired by petrol giant BP in June for £130 million. It also backed online watch retailer Watchfinder, acquired in June by Swiss luxury goods retailer Richemont. More recently, Beringea backed Thread, a popular app that helps men buy clothes tailored to their particular taste.
Veale said Brexit uncertainty had not impacted Beringea's deal flow and, while there is no guarantee the firm would hit its target, the company had successfully raised millions in previous years.
"We're seeing a strong flow of new investment opportunities, we're definitely up on where we were last year," he said. "There is always competition for good investments, and we continue to see a really strong flow... We're still pretty confident."
