Best Buy to open Best Buy Mobile store at Maplewood Mall: Best Buy Co. Inc. will open a Best Buy Mobile store at Maplewood Mall, its third standalone mobile-phone store in the state. The Richfield-based consumer electronics giant also has Best Buy Mobile stores at the Mall of America and Eden Prairie Center, as well as store-within-a-store locations inside all of the company’s full-line retail stores. Read full story
Supervalu lets employees pick new store-brand ice cream flavors: Three Supervalu Inc. employees will see their fantasy ice cream flavors — and their own faces — in supermarket aisles across the country, the company said Thursday. A sweepstakes held by the Eden Prairie-based retailer asked for employees’ dream flavors for Supervalu’s Stone Ridge Creamery ice cream line, according to a news release. Read full story
Twin Cities Q1 foreclosures up 22 percent: Twin Cities foreclosures increased by about 22 percent in the first three months of 2010 from the same period one year ago, according to a new industry report out Thursday. The 8,305 Minnesota and Wisconsin properties with first-quarter foreclosure filings in the Minneapolis-St. Paul region is a 2 percent improvement over the final quarter of 2009, according to the Q1 2010 Metropolitan Foreclosure Report by Irvine, Calif.-based Realty Trac Inc. Read full story
Xcel reports Q1 earnings dip: First-quarter earnings at Xcel Energy Inc. dropped 4 percent, from $174 million, or 38 cents per share, to $167 million, or 36 cents per share. The Minneapolis-based power utility said higher gas and electricity margins and increased sales, especially to Colorado and Texas residents, were offset by increases in operating and maintenance expenses and property taxes. Read full story
It appears that the banks are starting to clear out the foreclosure backlog.