Pam Goodfellow

Women's apparel pricing at Macy's is such a turnoff to consumers that they'd rather shop for clothes at lower-priced department stores, recent data suggest. Nearly 40 percent of Macy's shoppers who go to the department store and buy home goods, for example, tend to make an extra trip to Kohl's to buy women's clothes, according to a recent report from Prosper Insights & Analytics. "Macy's has a lot of women's clothing shoppers. It's our No. 3 women's clothing store, but we do see this cross-shopping, which we call lost opportunity," said Pam Goodfellow, an analyst at Prosper.

New companies are gaining ground on retail giants like Amazon, Walmart and Best Buy, according to Stores Magazines Favorite 50 Online Retailers survey. Conducted by BIGresearch, the survey found Macys, Forever 21, Aeropostale and Nordstrom each gained ground with online shoppers this year. Amazon.com, Walmart.com, eBay.com, BestBuy.com and JCPenney.com maintained the top five spots. Macys.com joined the top 10 for the first time, in part because of its new exclusive private labels. Tween and teen apparel retailers Forever21.com and Aeropostale.com both significantly improved their position from last year's ranking, performing above expectations. Nordstrom.com and GameStop.com both made the list