5 of retail’s most impactful deals in 2025

From Skechers selling itself to numerous moves in the Beyond Inc. saga, here’s a look at the top deals during the first half of the year.

In only the first six months of 2025, Walgreens announced its acquisition by Sycamore Partners, Dollar Tree divulged its sale of Family Dollar and Hudson’s Bay agreed to sell its IP to Canadian Tire Corp. 

Retail Dive since 2021 has tracked major deals in the industry, from IPOs to acquisitions, minority investments and more. In just the first half of 2025, Retail Dive counted 26 sales and acquisitions. That compares to 22 last year and 26 in 2023 in the same period.

In recent months, deals have surged, with nine of those deals taking place in May. That month, Levi’s sold Docker’s to Authentic Brands Group in a $311 million deal, while GameStop sold its Canadian business for an undisclosed amount.

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Guitar Center set for quick bankruptcy exit after plan approval (retaildive.com)

Guitar Center expects to emerge from Chapter 11 bankruptcy by Dec. 31 after recently winning approval in federal bankruptcy court for its reorganization plan, the company said in a press release. According to the musical instrument retailer, the plan allows it to shed more than $800 million in debt. At the same time, Guitar Center has raised $350 million in new secured notes and expects to have a new asset-based facility worth up to $375 million, as well as $165 million in new equity investments.

Print Units Through September Up 2%

Despite the lack of a hot new title in the first nine months of 2017, print unit sales for the period were 2% higher than in the comparable timeframe in 2016. According to NPD BookScan, print units were 467.7 million in the January–September period, up from 460.6 million the previous year. While it is certainly possible that some fall books will ring up big numbers, the small sales gain to date has been driven by backlist titles. Only three of the year’s top 10 bestsellers to date were released in this calendar year. John Grisham’s Camino Island was the top new book, selling more than 528,000 print copies since its release in June to land at #5 on the year-to-date bestseller list. The other new titles on the top 10 list are Ruth Ware’s The Woman in Cabin 10 (#7) and Lilac Girls by Martha Hall Kelly (#10). The bestselling title so far this year is Milk and Honey by Rupi Kaur. Released in October 2015, the book has sold more than 706,000 copies in 2017, easily outdistancing the second-place book, Oh, the Places You’ll Go by Dr. Seuss. Click Read More below for more of the story.

L Brands Reports Second Quarter Earnings

The company reported net sales of $2.755 billion for the second quarter ended July 29, 2017, compared to sales of $2.890 billion for the second quarter ended July 30, 2016. The company reported a comparable sales decrease of 8 percent for the second quarter ended July 29, 2017. For the second quarter ended July 29, 2017, the exit of the swim and apparel categories had a negative impact of about 6 percentage points and 9 percentage points to total company and Victoria’s Secret comparable sales, respectively. The second quarter comparable sales decline of 8 percent was below the company’s expectations. Accordingly, the company’s guidance for the remainder of the year reflects a more conservative sales forecast than its previous guidance. The company updated its guidance for 2017 full-year earnings per share to $3.00 to $3.20 from $3.10 to $3.40 previously, and issued guidance for third quarter earnings per share between $0.25 and $0.30. Click Read More below for additional detail.
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