STORES

Lindsay Hancock. My Better Batch

One appeal of baking mixes is that they’re faster than baking from scratch, but when it comes to My Better Batch, which launched in 2024, it was the company itself that got cooking quickly.

The cookie mix’s retail distribution rose from just 79 store locations in Q2 of 2025 to 3,544 in Q2 of 2026, a year over year increase of 4,386%, according to store counts provided by My Better Batch. Recent retail additions include Kroger, Albertsons, H-E-B, Giant Food, and Hy-Vee, while earlier placements include Target, Thrive Market, and The Fresh Market.

Lindsay Hancock, My Better Batch’s founder and CEO, is no stranger to grocery aisles or CPG brands. She started her career at The Fresh Market before moving to Creative Snacks Co., where she spent more than 11 years in multiple roles as the company was acquired by Kind and, later, became part of Mars after the corporation acquired Kind North America.

“I’ve been in food my entire career,” Hancock told Retail Brew. “I’ve never been in the baking aisle, and so this was a new area for me.”

When Hancock, who grew up making cookies from scratch with her mother and grandmother, made a study of the baking aisle, “one of the things that I noticed is that there really has been very little innovation in that aisle over time,” she said.

Keep reading here.—AAN

      

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E-COMMERCE

Meta

Facebook Marketplace turned 10 recently, and Meta is finally giving sellers tools to manage and grow their businesses.

The new app, called Seller, is built specifically for people who sell via the Facebook Marketplace. It brings tools sellers need into one place: AI-powered listing creation tool, inventory management, a unified inbox, and performance insights.

Facebook Marketplace launched in 2016 as a place for people to sell things they already own. With the Seller app, Meta is giving sellers proper e-commerce tools, a signal that the Marketplace is becoming a priority for the company.

Keep reading here.—VC

      

CONSUMER BEHAVIOR & TRENDS

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For a majority of shoppers, back-to-school shopping is already in full swing, as parents get an early start preparing for the school year, and others are spreading out their budgets across the summer.

Roughly two thirds (62%) of shoppers started their back-to-school shopping in early July, according to the latest data from the National Retail Federation. That number is down from 67% for the same period last year.

Instead, a lot of shoppers are not buying everything at once, but waiting for the best deals to keep things affordable. About 46% of those who haven’t finished their back-to-school shopping yet are holding out for better deals, while another 23% are deliberately spreading out spending to manage budgets, NRF’s data showed.

Still, summer sales events like Prime Day and similar promotions by big-box retailers remained a popular way to save money on back-to-school items; 54% of consumers used sales in June to purchase items for the school year, NRF noted.

Keep reading here.—VC

      

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swapping skus

Today’s top retail reads.

Cracks showing: Cracker Barrel CEO Julie Masino, who oversaw a controversial overhaul of the chain’s branding, is stepping down. (the New York Times)

Wrong order: The rise and fall of Starbucks’s AI-powered Automated Counting system. (Fast Company)

Two become one: David’s Bridal debuted its shop-in-shop, The Outlet by David’s Bridal, in Texas. (Retail Dive)

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Jobs

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