Labor Day weekend shoppers might have a little extra money to spend, but they will have to work harder to find discounts this year. Supply chain disruptions caused by the continuing pandemic and a series of severe weather events have had retailers struggling to maintain inventories and subsequently less-incentivized to discount items in stock – even for the usual Labor Day sales bonanzas on appliances, mattresses and autos, said Maryland Smith marketing experts Amna Kirmani and Jie Zhang.

As courses convene for the new academic year, Maryland Smith is welcoming eight new scholars to its faculty. Tejwansh (Tej) Anand is joining the decision, operations and information technologies department as a clinical professor. Anand earned a PhD from Columbia University.

Maryland Smith’s Rachelle Sampson is the recipient of the inaugural Panmure House Prize, considered one of the United Kingdom’s largest academic prizes. The $75,000 prize is administered by the Edinburgh Business School at Heriot-Watt University in partnership with U.S.-based long-term investment consultancy FCLTGlobal and funded by Baillie Gifford. It recognizes research identifying potential flows of capital to innovation – in hope of finding the next major technological, retail or pharmaceutical up-and-comer.