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Fast-casual salad chain Salad and Go is closing more stores and exiting Texas and Oklahoma completely. The eatery will close a total of 32 stores, 25 in Texas and seven in Oklahoma, by January 11. The closures will impact around 600 employees. The company will also close its Dallas headquarters and relocate to Phoenix. Salad and Go operates as a drive-through and grab-and-go business, known for affordable salads, wraps, and other healthy menu items. The fast-casual chain was founded in 2013 in Gilbert, Arizona. Salad and Go began rapid expansion efforts in 2022. However, the salad chain has recently been reducing its retail footprint, closing 41 of its stores in September 2025. Salad and Go will focus its efforts in its home state of Arizona Until recently, the salad chain served customers in four states: Arizona, Nevada, Oklahoma, and Texas. Moving forward, it will only operate restaurants in Arizona and Nevada. After assessing our business, we made the decision to exit our Texas and Oklahoma markets and refocus on strengthening our core operations in Arizona and Nevada, CEO Mike Tattersfield told Fast Company in an email. “By consolidating our operations at our Phoenix area headquarters, we can focus on what matters most: food quality, menu innovation, guest experience and building for long-term growth.” “Were grateful to our team members in Texas and Oklahoma for the care they brought every day, and we deeply appreciate the communities that welcomed Salad and Go,” Tattersfield said. Tattersfield, who is the former president and CEO of Krispy Kreme, joined Salad and Go in April 2025. Tattersfield also told the Phoenix Business Journal that the closures are the result of the economic burden of a flawed expansion plan and a large central kitchen in Dallas: We were so focused on expanding out in Texas and other areas and we neglected Arizona,” he told the journal.
Category:
E-Commerce
The dreaded performance review draws the ire of employees and managers alike. Workers fret that reviews fail to capture the full scope of their work, or that they are an unfair assessment of their performance. For managers, reviews can be a time-consuming nuisance and involve the challenging task of delivering tough feedback. But a new study from Cornell University finds that the structure of the performance review can have a huge impact on how workers feel about them. Over the last decade, a number of companies have revamped their performance reviews, seemingly to address the long-standing pain points. The likes of Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley have moved away from numerical ratings, while tech companies like Microsoft eliminated stack rankings (reviews that essentially rank employees against their colleagues) and Adobe eliminated reviews altogether. (More recently, however, tech giants like Google and Meta have actually pushed for more stringent evaluations of employees and, in turn, lower ratings.) The Cornell researchers examined how the shift away from numerical reviews has influenced employee sentiment. Emily Zitek, a professor of organizational behavior, and her coauthors analyzed how employees feel about performance reviews that emphasize narrative or qualitative feedback over numerical rankings. The team looked at three different performance review formats: those that exclusively used either numerical ratings or narrative feedback, and those that employed a mix of both. What the researchers found overall was that employees believed performance reviews were, in fact, more fair when they did not have numbers attached and were purely narrative-driven. Even if they’re given kind of average numbers versus wording that says they were very average, it feels more fair if they just see the words and not the numbers, Zitek says. So we thought that was very interesting. We were originally expecting the combined feedback to still be viewed positively, but people didn’t like the numbers within that either. Employees were also more likely to want to improve their performance if they received narrative feedbackand, more notably, if they felt their review was fair. Obviously, one of the goals is improvement, Zitek says. [If youre] just giving people numbers, they don’t know as much about what they need to do to perform better. But there was an exception: If their reviews were very positive, then people perceived them as fair, regardless of format. People love knowing if they’re at the top, Zitek says. More average ratings, on the other hand, seem to betray an employees self-perceptionwhich is why a more middling review feels more palatable if there is no number attached. Psychology research has shown a lot of people think they are above average, or that they’re doing better than they are, Zitek adds. When they get narrative-only feedback, they’re able to maintain that view because there’s no explicit information showing that they didn’t do well. Thats one of the reasons Zitek and her coauthors argue there is still a place for numerical ratings, in spite of the studys findings: If one of the goals of performance reviews is to determine raises and bonuses, then including numbers-based feedback can be importantand arguably more fair. If employees are deluding themselves that they’re performing really well, sometimes it helps to have the number, she says. Sometimes you want employees to realistically know where they stand. And yes, theyre going to be mad about it; they’re not going to think it’s fair. But that could be important. The reality is that many companies still rely on numerical ratings to make decisions about compensationand if they stop using those metrics in reviews, they may still utilize a ranking system without informing employees. If the company is going to want some kind of number anyway, it seems worse to not tell the employee that number, Zitek says. And that’s what some companies are doingthey have shadow rankings behind the scenes. They don’t tell them to the employees, and then employees are like, Wait, why did I get a smaller bonus than this other person? Regardless of format, one of the most frequent critiques of performance reviews is that they are vulnerable to bias. Even if reviews are standardized across a company, your performance rating can be impacted by a number of variables and often hinges on how your manager or team approaches reviews. A narrative component can help address this issuebut that still depends on how managers are trained and whether they understand the value of proffering real feedback. To ensure managers actually commit to the review process, Zitek says, its important for employers to emphasize the purpose of providing thoughtful feedback. People are more willing to do things if they know why they’re doing it, she says. So it could just be making an effort to convince the managers [that] this isn’t just another box to check. Its also crucial that managers are trained on how to give constructive performance feedback, she addssomething that many employers fail to do effectivelyand that they offer it at a more regular cadence so employees are not surprised when their review rolls around. Feedback can be uncomfortable to give sometimes, Zitek says. But it’s more uncomfortable later if they don’t get promoted and don’t understand whyand they could have been performing better the entire time if they were given that feedback.
Category:
E-Commerce
American Airlines will begin offering free, high-speed Wi-Fi on flights beginning this month. The airline made the announcement this week in a press release, explaining that the service will extend to around two million flights in 2026. However, not all fliers will receive the perk. The new service will be sponsored by wireless provider AT&T. Free high-speed Wi-Fi isnt just a perkits essential for todays travelers,” said Heather Garboden, chief customer officer at American Airlines, in the release. The rollout won’t kick off all at once, the announcement explained, but instead will happen in phases. This month, the service will be available only on “narrowbody and dual-class regional fleets,” the announcement says. But in just a few months, it will be made available on “nearly every American Airlines flight.” Who gets free, high-speed Wi-Fi? While the service will be available on almost all flights, it’s not for everyone. Eligible fliers have to be in the airline’s loyalty program, AAdvantage. If you aren’t a member but want to become one, you can sign up for a free account on the American Airlines website by providing a few personal details. Doing so will enable you to start earning miles, loyalty points, and free Wi-Fi on flights. How can AAdvantage members access free Wi-Fi on their flights? Accessing free Wi-Fi for AAdvantage members can be accomplished through the new and improved aainflight.com portal. Customers will be asked to log in using their AAdvantage membership number and password. Then, they can select Free Wi-Fi to start using the service. If you don’t have access to free Wi-Fi, it’s available on most American Airlines flights for $10. Who else offers free Wi-Fi? Not having to pay for Wi-Fi is certainly a desirable perk for fliers. However, American Airlines is not the first to offer it. Many U.S. airlines, like Delta, United, Alaska Airlines, Hawaiian Airlines, and Southwest, also ensure free Wi-Fi for loyalty members. However, JetBlue remains the only U.S. airline that offers free Wi-Fi to all travelers on most of its flightsa service it first rolled out in 2013. By January 2017, the service was extended to all flights. Wi-Fi for non-members costs around $8 to $10 on most carriers. But for longer, international flights, prices can go up to as much as $35. Frequent fliers, especially those who are traveling internationally often and want Wi-Fi access, can save money by purchasing monthly Wi-Fi passes on their preferred airline, rather than paying for the service on each and every flight.
Category:
E-Commerce
If you had a severe case of the Sunday Scaries last weekend, you are not alone. Its a sentiment many have been sharing online. Ready or not, with it comes an influx of unread emails, meeting invites, and responsibilitiessmugly pushed to the New Year in the last weeks of Decembernow coming back to haunt us all. Indeed, the first Monday of the year is the Monday-est Monday of all. Oh god, one TikTok user posted on Monday 6th. Everyone is circling back. Worst aesthetic ever: Back to work in the first week of jan, another wrote, riffing on TikToks rare aesthetic trend. Some have used the lyrics to The Smiths Heaven Knows Im Miserable Now” to sum up the feeling of corporate workers logging back on the first Monday of the year. After weeks of late nights of holiday fun, overindulgence, friends and family time and a slower pace of life, the abrupt shift back to the corporate grind can trigger feelings of anxiety in even the most enthusiastic of employees. Monday 5th January isnt for the weak, another TikTok user wrote in the caption of a clip. The idea of an unwanted convo at 9am on Monday 5th, the closed captions reads, soundtracked to frantic voiceovers sputtering workplace jargon, including KPIs, decks, emails, and Salesforce. If this week so far youve felt unusually slow, unfocused, or overwhelmed, youre likely experiencing what is commonly referred to as the holiday hangover, or January blues. These feelings are not unique to one generation or another, and tend to resurface like clockwork come January each year. As another TikTok user wrote: The way I logged on after two weeks off only to realise i can barely remember what i was doing when I left or what im supposed to be doing now so im lowkey terrified and every email and teams alert feels like a jack-in-the-box. Relatable. While time off work over the holidays has been linked to reduced stress and overall improved health, these benefits tend to vanish relatively quickly once back to work. And research has shown when workers are expected to hit the ground running after a break, they often experience depleted energy, focus and motivation. Reestablishing some semblance of routine post-holidays is essential for keeping the January blues to a minimum. This means fixing sleep schedules after going to bed consistently after midnight and waking up at midday for the past few weeks. Giving up the chocolate and leftovers from the fridge diet and going back to overnight oats and desk salads. And not only having to remember what day of the week it is, but also spending the next few months mistakenly writing 2025, crossing it out, and rewriting 2026. The key is to keep expectations low. If you simply showed up, caught up on the post-holiday small talk with colleagues, and made it to 5 p.m.? Honestlythat’s enough for this week.
Category:
E-Commerce
Inside Girl Scouts headquarters in New York City and its two licensed bakeries, a team of trend forecasters, marketers, and food scientists spend years cooking up its next iconic cookie. Now, fans of the annual cookie sale are about to get a taste of what the Girl Scouts of the USA (GSUSA) team has been baking behind closed doors. The newest addition to the cookie lineup are Exploremores, a rocky road ice cream-inspired sandwich cookie with chocolate shortbread exteriors and chocolate, marshmallow, and toasted almond-flavored cream centers. For Girl Scout cookie enjoyers, a fresh cookie is always a welcome surprise. But, according to Wendy Lou, GSUSAs chief revenue officer and the mastermind behind the nonprofits cookie program, the cookie invention process is an intensive project that requires year-round dedication. Cookie Season may be once a year, but behind the scenes, the conversation about whats next is always happening, Lou says. [Photo: GSUSA] A brief history of the Girl Scout cookie Girl Scout cookies date back almost as far as the Girl Scouts themselves. Along the way, dozens of new flavors have been tested and ultimately retired into the archives of Girl Scout cookies past. According to GSUSAs official record, the first Girl Scout cookies are believed to have been baked in 1917, just five years after GSUSA was first founded. Initially, the cookies were a more run-of-the-mill bake sale fundraiserbut in the following decades, the concept went national, becoming a more organized affair including specially licensed bakeries and a streamlined list of flavors. By 1978, all cookie boxes (regardless of the baker) included uniform GSUSA branding, as well as officially named flavors. Since then, GSUSA has adopted a kind of two-pronged approach to its cookie sales. Each year, the company returns to a few classic cookie flavors that customers can reliably count on, historically including Thin Mints, Do-si-dos, Samoas, and Trefoils. Alongside those tried-and-true offerings, the nonprofit generally also includes at least one new or limited-time cookie to add some intrigue to the mix. This second category has produced treats including VanChos, a pack of chocolate and vanilla sandwich cookies that ran from 1974 to 1983; Echo, an Oreo-style cookie that lasted from just 1987 to 1989; and Savannah Smiles, a lemon-shaped wedge that was purchasable from 2011 to 2019. More recently, a cookie called the Raspberry Rally was available for just one season in 2023, resulting in a black market-esque resale bonanza. Its a clever strategy that keeps customers coming back each year, both for their favorite classic cookies and to try something differentbut in order to make the cut, a new Girl Scout cookie must first face an intensive development process. [Photo: GSUSA] Why it takes three years to design a cookie According to Lou, GSUSA doesnt adhere to a strict annual cadence for new cookie releases. Instead, its team regularly reviews cookie performance, food trends, and feedback from Girl Scouts to judge its current cookie portfolio and decide when its due for a fresh addition. Innovation is never off, she adds. Were always looking ahead. And cookie innovation is no quick affair. Lou says brainstorming for a new release typically begins around three years in advance, starting with early ideation based on consumer trends, followed by taste testing and naming. In recent years, this naming process has expanded beyond simply describing the cookie to capturing some part of the Girl Scout experience (see 2021s Adventurfuls, for example). Exploremores was chosen to reflect the spirit of curiosity, adventure, and exploration at the heart of Girl Scouting, Lou says. Every name is intentionally selected to connect back to our mission and the experiences girls gain through the program. Even after a cookie is approved, packaged, and coordinated with GSUSAs two bakeries, it still takes about 18 months to make it to an actual cookie stand. From there, its fate is annually reevaluated based on sales performance, local Girl Scout council needs, and operational considerations. In 2025, for example, GSUSA retired its Girl Scout Smores and Toast-Yay! flavors, which were introduced in 2017 and 2021, respectively. Now, they live in the storied archive of cookies past. For any new cookie, like the Exploremore, lifespan is ultimately determined by how customersand scoutsrespond to it. While some cookies are retired to make room for innovation, fans know that Girl Scout history is full of beloved cooiesand who knows what the future might hold? Lou says. What never changes is our commitment to delivering a lineup that excites customers and helps girls succeed.
Category:
E-Commerce
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