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Sinclair and Nexstar said Friday they would return “Jimmy Kimmel Live!” to ABC affiliate broadcast stations on Friday.
The companies, which together own and operate roughly 70 ABC stations, had preempted the late night show since its return to the air on Tuesday.
The station owners denied government influence in their decisions to preempt the show.

On Tuesday, May 13, 2025 at North Javits in New York City, an incredible roster of all-star talent will tout their connections to storytelling, Disney, and each other while showcasing their latest projects for the upcoming year.
Michael Le Brecht | Disney General Entertainment Content | Getty Images

Sinclair and Nexstar are returning “Jimmy Kimmel Live!” to ABC affiliate broadcast stations beginning Friday, the companies said in separate statements.
The announcements come three days after Disney’s ABC broadcast network returned the late night program to its air after a nearly week-long suspension. Disney had temporarily suspended the late night show following comments Kimmel made about the alleged murder of conservative activist Charlie Kirk and President Donald Trump’s MAGA movement.

“Our objective throughout this process has been to ensure that programming remains accurate and engaging for the widest possible audience. We take seriously our responsibility as local broadcasters to provide programming that serves the interests of our communities, while also honoring our obligations to air national network programming,” Sinclair said in a statement on Friday.
“Over the last week, we have received thoughtful feedback from viewers, advertisers, and community leaders representing a wide range of perspectives,” Sinclair said. “We have also witnessed troubling acts of violence, including the despicable incident of a shooting at an ABC affiliate station in Sacramento. These events underscore why responsible broadcasting matters and why respectful dialogue between differing voices remains so important.”
The broadcast station owners said earlier this week they would continue to preempt Kimmel’s late night show, meaning it would be unavailable on local stations for roughly 20% of the country, while they evaluated the situation and continued discussions with Disney.
Sinclair owns roughly 40 ABC affiliate stations in the U.S., including one in in Washington, D.C. Nexstar owns about 30 in markets including Salt Lake City and New Orleans.
Kimmel addressed the situation — and the ongoing preemptions — during his returning show this week.

“We are still on the air in most of the country, except, ironically, from Washington, D.C., where we have been preempted,” Kimmel said during Tuesday’s monologue. “After almost 23 years on the air, we’re suddenly not being broadcast in 20% of the country, which is not a situation we relish.”
Sinclair said Friday it had proposed measures to “strengthen accountability, viewer feedback, and community dialogue” at ABC and its affiliates.
“While ABC and Disney have not yet adopted these measures, and Sinclair respects their right to make those decisions under our network affiliate agreements, we believe such measures could strengthen trust and accountability,” it said.
Nexstar said in a statement: “We have had discussions with executives at The Walt Disney Company and appreciate their constructive approach to addressing our concerns.”
Disney declined to comment Friday.
Kimmel’s suspension last week came shortly after Nexstar announced it would not air the program in light of the host’s comments. Sinclair soon after said it would likewise preempt the program.
Those announcements followed comments from Federal Communications Commission Chairman Brendan Carr that suggested ABC affiliate stations could be at risk of losing broadcast station licenses over Kimmel’s remarks, which came during a show monologue.
The series of events raised questions about influence by the Trump administration on the media and First Amendment protections.
“Our decision to preempt this program was independent of any government interaction or influence,” Sinclair said Friday. “Free speech provides broadcasters with the right to exercise judgment as to the content on their local stations. While we understand that not everyone will agree with our decisions about programming, it is simply inconsistent to champion free speech while demanding that broadcasters air specific content.”
Earlier this week, Sen. Maria Cantwell, D-Wash., sent a letter to Sinclair pushing to bring “Jimmy Kimmel Live!” back on air. Sinclair owns the Seattle ABC affiliate station.
Nexstar similarly denied any government influence.
“As a local broadcaster, Nexstar remains committed to protecting the First Amendment while producing and airing local and national news that is fact-based and unbiased and, above all, broadcasting content that is in the best interest of the communities we serve,” Nexstar said in a statement.
“We stand apart from cable television, monolithic streaming services, and national networks in our commitment – and obligation – to be stewards of the public airwaves and to protect and reflect the specific sensibilities of our communities,” the statement continued. “To be clear, our commitment to those principles has guided our decisions throughout this process, independent of any external influence from government agencies or individuals.” More

Spirit is planning to suspend 40 routes as it race to cut costs in its second bankruptcy.
Earlier this week, the carrier said it would furlough about 1,800 flight attendants.

A Spirit Airlines aircraft undergoes operations in preparation for departure at the Austin-Bergstrom International Airport in Austin, Texas, on Feb. 12, 2024.
Brandon Bell | Getty Images

Spirit Airlines told staff Friday that it’s suspending about 40 routes, finalizing a 25% cut to its November schedule as it scrambles to slash costs in bankruptcy and focus on profitable flights.
“While the news has been tough, we believe the clarity will help us move forward as a team,” Rana Ghosh, Spirit’s chief commercial officer, said in a note to employees, which was seen by CNBC.

Earlier this week Spirit said it plans to furlough about 1,800 flight attendants, around a third of its cabin crew members.

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Spirit filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection last month for the second time in less than a year as it struggled with higher-than-expected costs and weaker travel demand than it projected.
Spirit didn’t immediately comment on the routes it is cutting, but Ghosh said in his note that Spirit will be halting service in Hartford, Connecticut, and Minneapolis.
He also said Spirit has hired Andrea Lusso, who previously was the principal for supply chain and network design at Amazon Air, the online retailer’s air shipment arm. Lusso will serve as vice president of network planning. His predecessor, John Kirby, retired last month after more than 40 years in the industry. More

Boeing can sign off on some of its 737 Max and 787 Dreamliner planes before they’re handed over to customers, the FAA said Friday.
The FAA had restricted Boeing in 2019 from issuing airworthiness certificates for its own planes in the wake of two fatal crashes of the company’s bestselling 737 Max aircraft.
The change shows Boeing is winning more confidence from its regulator after years of safety and manufacturing crises.

Boeing 737 Max planes sit at the airport in Renton, Washington.
Leslie Josephs | CNBC

Boeing can sign off on some of its 737 Max and 787 Dreamliner planes before they’re handed over to customers, the Federal Aviation Administration said Friday, the latest sign the manufacturer is regaining confidence from its regulator after years of safety crises.
The FAA stopped allowing Boeing to issue its own airworthiness certificates for 737 Max airplanes in 2019 after two fatal crashes. It made a similar decision for Boeing 787s in 2022 because of production defects. 

Since the second Max crash, in March 2019, the FAA solely issued airworthiness certificates, which certify planes as safe to fly, for the Maxes. The FAA said that it and Boeing will issue the certificates on alternating weeks.
“Safety drives everything we do, and the FAA will only allow this step forward because we are confident it can be done safely,” the FAA said in a statement. “This decision follows a thorough review of Boeing’s ongoing production quality and will allow our inspectors to focus additional surveillance in the production process.”
Boeing didn’t immediately comment.
The company has been working for years to move past a series of safety and manufacturing issues. A midair blowout of a door panel from one of its new 737 Max 9s in January 2024 set those plans back further, with the FAA capping production of the Maxes and increasing scrutiny of Boeing, a top U.S. exporter.
“If Boeing requests a production rate increase, onsite FAA safety inspectors will conduct extensive planning and reviews with Boeing to determine if they can safely produce more airplanes,” the FAA said Friday.

Boeing CEO Kelly Ortberg, who took the helm just over a year ago, has said the company is focused on stabilizing its production rate of its Maxes at 38 month, and he has expressed optimism about evaluating an increase beyond that with the FAA.
“I feel pretty confident that we’ll be in a position here pretty soon to sit down with the FAA and go through what we call a capstone review, which is the process we go through to not just go through these [key performance indicators], but to look at our entire supply chain readiness, our continued production readiness and move forward with that,” he said at a Morgan Stanley investor conference earlier this month.
Boeing shares were up about 4% Friday. More

More than a dozen pages on the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention website related to sexual and gender identity, health equity, and other topics have been taken down, CNBC has learned. 
The CDC received a directive from the Health and Human Services Department, which oversees the agency, to remove certain webpages by the end of the day Sept. 19, according to an internal CDC email viewed by CNBC, which was sent that day to some employees whose work is related to the pages.
Some health equity advocates say removing such resources could create gaps in access to critical health information, especially for marginalized groups, and undermine efforts to promote equitable care.

A sign for the CDC sits outside of their facility at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Roybal campus in Atlanta, Georgia, U.S., May 30, 2025.
Megan Varner | Reuters

More than a dozen pages on the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention website related to sexual and gender identity, health equity, and other topics have been taken down, CNBC has learned. 
The CDC received a directive from the Health and Human Services Department, which oversees the agency, to remove certain webpages by the end of the day Sept. 19, according to an internal CDC email viewed by CNBC, which was sent that day to some employees whose work is related to the pages.

The pages include one about sexually transmitted infections and gay men, another about healthy equity for people with disabilities, and additional fact sheets on asexuality and bisexuality. Some health equity advocates say removing such resources could create gaps in access to critical health information, especially for marginalized groups, and undermine efforts to promote equitable care.
The removal of “critical materials from trusted government resources endangers the health of patients and the public,” a spokesperson for the LBGT PA Caucus, a nonprofit promoting LGBTQ+ health-care equity, said in a statement.
“Stripping away resources on gender identity does not erase the need, it only erodes trust, creates confusion, and places patients at greater risk,” the spokesperson said. “Clinicians and the communities they serve rely on accessible, accurate, and inclusive guidance to deliver safe and effective care.”
The email did not provide details on why HHS directed the CDC to remove the pages or why it targeted certain topics. But the topics of some of the resources taken down are longtime targets of the Trump administration, which has issued a series of executive actions that limit transgender and nonbinary people’s rights and rolled back efforts to increase diversity, equity and inclusion. 
In a statement, an HHS spokesperson said the “CDC continues to align their website with Administration priorities and Executive Orders.” The CDC directed CNBC to HHS for comment.

Arrows pointing outwards

CDC web page on health equity for people with disabilities was online on Aug. 27, according to the Wayback Machine, but is offline as of Sept. 26.
CDC website, Wayback Machine

It’s not the first time that the administration has targeted health resources on federal agency websites.
Thousands of pages across websites for the CDC and Food and Drug Administration, among other agencies, were abruptly pulled down beginning in late January under President Donald Trump’s executive order barring references to gender identity in federal policies and documents. In February, a federal judge ordered HHS, the CDC and FDA to temporarily restore public access to the pages while litigation moves forward. 
That same judge ruled in July that the government unlawfully ordered the mass removal of health resources from federal sites and required agencies to review and restore the affected pages. Following that ruling, the Trump administration reported to the court on Sept. 19 that most agencies have finished restoring the pages, with 185 back in compliance and only 11 CDC pages still under review, according to court documents. It is unclear how many of the pages taken down this month were at issue in the lawsuit.

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It is unclear which pages were still under review as of Sept. 19, and why the CDC took down more pages on that same day following the ruling.
Attached to the internal CDC email was a spreadsheet of more than a dozen pages that the agency said had been taken down as of Sept. 19. A separate spreadsheet compiled by agency employees and viewed by CNBC included an additional site that appears to be offline.
CNBC verified that the following pages are now offline. The digital archive site Wayback Machine also shows when they were last active. Several pages were online as recently as early September, according to Wayback Machine, but it is unclear when the CDC officially removed all of them. 

Some pages listed on the spreadsheet attached to the internal CDC email are still online. That includes a page that monitors laboratory-confirmed hospitalizations among children and adults associated with respiratory syncytial virus.  More

President Donald Trump slashed the price of his Gold Card immigration plan from $5 million to $1 million.
He promised it will grant residency in “record time,” making it one of the most sought after golden-visas in the world.
Advisors to the ultra-wealthy said their clients are expressing interest in getting access to the U.S. education system, health care system, banking system and financial markets.

U.S. President Donald Trump signs an executive order in the Oval Office at the White House on September 19, 2025 in Washington, DC. Trump signed two executive orders, establishing the “Trump Gold Card” and introducing a $100,000 fee for H-1B visas.
Andrew Harnik | Getty Images News | Getty Images

A version of this article first appeared in CNBC’s Inside Wealth newsletter with Robert Frank, a weekly guide to the high-net-worth investor and consumer. Sign up to receive future editions, straight to your inbox.
By slashing the price of the Gold Card from $5 million to $1 million, President Donald Trump has created one of the most coveted deals in the global visa market, with demand already surging among the world’s wealthy, according to immigration attorneys.

Last week, Trump signed an executive order announcing the official launch of the Gold Card, which will cost $1 million and grant residency in “record time,” he said. When he first announced the Gold Card in February, the price was $5 million. While the Gold Card website also touts a future $5 million Platinum Card, with added tax benefits, the Platinum Card wasn’t in the executive order and wasn’t mentioned in the press event.
With its new discounted price and promise of speedy approvals, the Gold Card has instantly become one of the most sought after “golden visas” in the world, with a price below many other countries. Singapore’s investment visa program, for instance, costs nearly $8 million, while New Zealand’s new program is just under $3 million. Even Samoa is more expensive, requiring a $1.4 million investment.
“The Gold Card is almost too cheap,” said Reaz Jafri of international law firm Withers. “You get access to the U.S. education system, health-care system, banking system and financial markets, all for $1 million. It’s a pittance for many of these families. I think they should have kept it at $5 million to make it special.”
The global wealthy are ready to write the checks. Jafri said he was speaking at a family office conference in Singapore this week and was approached by three families — two based in China and one based in India — who immediately expressed interest in buying a Gold Card. He said he expects his firm alone will help process “hundreds” of applications once the program is off the ground and proven.
Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick said the government plans to issue 80,000 Gold Cards. Together with potential Platinum Card and the new H-1B fees, which were raised to $100,000, he said the programs are expected to raise $100 billion in federal revenue.

The Gold Card still faces obstacles. Despite the announcement at the White House last Friday, there is no way to apply for the visa yet. The website announcing the Gold Card that went live in June asks for basic information from potential applicants, including their name and country of residence. So far, people who registered on the site said they haven’t received any updates.
The program is also likely to be challenged in the courts and potentially by Congress. Because immigration law is set by Congress, the president created the Gold Card through several legal workarounds, including using the existing EB-1 and EB-2 programs as the infrastructure or basis for the Gold Card. The $1 million fee is officially labeled an “unrestricted gift” to the government rather than an official fee change.

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The tentative legal status may also give the overseas wealthy pause at first, according to immigration attorneys. Many applicants will likely wait to see the first Gold Cards awarded and granted before spending the $1 million. And some may wait even longer.
“These things always take a little bit of time to ramp up,” said Dominic Volek group head of private clients at Henley & Partners. “People don’t want to be the first one to try it. The majority of our clients like to see the program up and running for three to six months and see the outcomes before they commit.”
Volek said he’s already had a number of inquiries from clients and expects the program to attract at least 5,000 to 10,000 applications a year.
“From a price point perspective, it’s definitely more attractive at $1 million instead of $5 million,” Volek said. “And if it’s as quick as they say, it becomes even more attractive.”
The Gold Card also comes at an opportune moment in the global visa market. As geopolitical uncertainty, wars and political tensions rise across the world, the ultra-wealthy are buying alternative citizenships and residencies for a “Plan B” or hedge against their home countries.
An estimated 142,000 millionaires are expected to relocate to another country in 2025, according to a report from New World Wealth and Henley & Partners. The U.S. is one of the top destinations, with 7,500 millionaires expected to move to the U.S. this year, ranking only second to the United Arab Emirates, according to the report. Most of the millionaires coming to America are from Asia, the U.K. and Latin America.

Demand for the Gold Card is likely to come mainly from China and India, according to immigration advisors. Yet applicants from those countries may be disappointed. The EB-1 and EB-2 programs (which form the basis for the Gold Card) already have large backlogs of applicants from China and India, stretching for years. If Gold Card buyers are allowed to skip to the front of the line because of their $1 million donation, the applicants who have been waiting could file lawsuits. At the same time, Gold Card buyers won’t be willing to spend $1 million if they’re forced to wait years for approval.
Dramatically expanding the number of visas available through the EB-1 and EB-2 programs would also likely require approval from Congress, advisors said.
“India and China are actually excluded in a way from the Gold Card,” Volek said. “The EB-1 and EB-2 routes already have significant backlogs for China and India. So immediate access to the Gold Card may not actually work if you’re born in one of those two countries.”
The Gold Card also has some downsides compared with other golden visa programs around the world. The $1 million donation isn’t refundable, while visas in other countries are structured as investments that could generate returns. And unlike most other countries, the U.S. taxes its citizens and residents on their worldwide income, even if it’s earned overseas.
The Platinum Card is designed to partially avoid the taxation issue in exchange for a higher price. According to the White House, the Platinum Card would allow holders to remain in the U.S. for 270 days a year without paying taxes on their overseas income. Currently, overseas nationals are subject to worldwide tax if they are in the U.S. for 183 days during a three-year period using a complex IRS day-counting formula known as the “substantial presence” test.
Some advisors say the Platinum Card will be a tougher sell than the Gold Card, since it doesn’t lead to a green card or citizenship and has limited benefits for the ultra-rich who already spend time in the U.S.
“It will not sell well,” said David Lesperance, of Lesperance Associates. “Few will consider it worth $5 million just to spend an additional 91 days in the U.S.”
Others say the Gold and Platinum cards will appeal to different types of overseas rich. The Platinum Card may be appealing to the ultra-wealthy — say, billionaires from Asia or the Middle East — who want to be in the U.S. but want to shield their companies and income from U.S. taxes. Jafri said he’s already received inquiries about the Platinum Card from four Brazilian family offices.
The Gold Card is more fitting for the sons and daughters of the overseas rich who want to go to college in the U.S. and become more competitive in the U.S. job market after graduating.
“A lot of the kids of these overseas billionaires don’t want to run the family business and want to be architects or doctors or engineers and have regular jobs,” Jafri said. “Or maybe they want to create a startup in America. The Gold Card is very attractive for that group.”
Given the relatively low price of the Gold and Platinum cards, Jafri said the White House should consider eventually issuing a Black Card.
“They could charge $20 million or $25 million and exempt the buyers from the estate tax,” he said. “That would be a game changer. I bet 1,000 people would do it and they would bring all their assets to the U.S.” More

Private investment firms of the ultra-wealthy have made splashy deals backing AI startups.
But the majority of family offices are investing in artificial intelligence via public equities, per a recent survey by Goldman Sachs.
Family offices were also more likely to report investing in companies that leverage AI for productivity and efficiency or secondary beneficiaries of the AI boom such as energy providers than startups, according to the survey.

Young Asian woman holding smartphone with a computer generated background. Innovation, metaverse and futuristic concepts.
Oscar Wong | Moment | Getty Images

A version of this article first appeared in CNBC’s Inside Wealth newsletter with Robert Frank, a weekly guide to the high-net-worth investor and consumer. Sign up to receive future editions, straight to your inbox.
Investment firms of the ultra-wealthy, such as the family office of Jeff Bezos, are making headlines with massive fundraises for artificial intelligence startups.

Late last month, Bezos Expeditions co-led a $405 million round for robotics startup Field AI with backers including Laurene Powell Jobs’ Emerson Collective. In the past six months alone, Hillspire, the family office of Google billionaire Eric Schmidt, has backed at least six AI startups, per data provided exclusively to CNBC by Fintrx, a private wealth intelligence platform.
But while tech unicorns get most of the buzz, family offices prefer to invest in the AI boom via public equities, according to a recent poll by Goldman Sachs. The bank’s survey of 245 worldwide family offices found that 52% are exposed to AI through primary public equities or ETFs, while only a quarter reported investing directly in AI startups.
Goldman Sachs’ Meena Flynn told Inside Wealth that family offices likely have even greater exposure through stocks than they realize.
“The top nine out of 10 stocks in the S&P are AI-driven stories, and they make up 40% of the S&P,” said the co-head of global private wealth management.
Flynn partially attributed the preference for AI stocks to more tempered valuations in public markets.

“If you look over the last five years, and you look at the valuation discrepancies between private markets and public markets, the private markets really needed to grow into the valuations that some of the [general partners] entered into,” she said. “People, I think, have more confidence in the public markets from a valuation perspective.”

Family offices were also more likely to report investing in companies that leverage AI for productivity and efficiency (38%) or secondary beneficiaries of the AI boom such as energy providers (32%) than AI startups. (Respondents were allowed to pick multiple answers). The report noted that 27% of family offices anticipated being overweight to energy and materials firms in the public and private markets in the next 12 months.
The respondents, two-thirds of which reported managing at least $1 billion in assets, were polled from May 20 to June 18. Nearly nine out of 10 reported some form of investment in AI. Only 5% indicated that they were not considering investing in the space.
Family offices are not known for their tech savvy, with Deloitte estimating the average age of family office principals at 68 years old. But Goldman Sachs’ Jean Altier said they have warmed quickly to AI as it’s become ubiquitous in everyday life, unlike other new technologies like blockchain. She gave the example of Google’s AI search function.

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“It’s already a part of people’s life,” said the global head of managed strategies. “I do think people’s native exposure to AI has happened a lot quicker than some other technological innovations.”
Despite respondents’ demonstrated preference for public equities, Flynn noted that accessing more opportunities requires investing in private markets.
“There are some 800 unicorns right now. If you assume historical IPO exit rate per year, it would take 12 years to clear the backlog versus four years pre-pandemic,” she said. More

Private holding company Ames Watson acquired bankrupt tween retailer Claire’s in late August for $140 million.
Co-founders Tom Ripley and Lawrence Berger told CNBC they plan on revitalizing the company by upgrading its merchandising and marketing.
Ames Watson said the process of rebuilding Claire’s could take up to a year to be reflected in stores nationwide.

People walk by a Claire’s store on December 11, 2024 in San Rafael, California.
Justin Sullivan | Getty Images

Claire’s is headed for a major makeover.
The tween retailer, known for its ear piercing stations, jewelry and purple carpeting, declared bankruptcy in early August, the second time in seven years, citing nearly $500 million in debt and an increasingly competitive environment.

Weeks later, private holding company Ames Watson announced it was buying up roughly 1,000 Claire’s stores across North America in a $140 million deal to rebuild the brand. The announcement paused the liquidation process at most Claire’s stores.
“We went and started to do some very deep due diligence, and we came to the conclusion that this was a broken business, not a broken brand,” Ames Watson co-founder Lawrence Berger told CNBC.
Ames Watson’s portfolio includes makeovers of other businesses, including hat retailer Lids and women’s retailer South Moon Under. Berger said the company, which has more than $2 billion in revenue, thinks of itself as a “mini Berkshire Hathaway,” buying and transforming companies without any intentions of selling them.
On top of its mounting debt, Claire’s has been facing a multitude of challenges. The retailer is expected to face headwinds from President Donald Trump’s global tariffs, and malls have seen dwindling traffic over the past few years. Competitors, like Studs and Lovisa, have also popped up, aiming to offer sleeker ear piercing experiences.
Fellow Ames Watson co-founder Tom Ripley said he was first introduced to Claire’s through his twin daughters, who both got their ears pierced at one of the retailer’s stores over a decade ago. Ripley said that experience, coupled with customers’ loyalty to the brand, showed him that it was worth investing in.

“It’s a temple to girlhood and that place you buy your first lip gloss, a friendship bracelet and your first piercing,” Ripley told CNBC. “Claire’s has been a rite of passage to generations.”

Revitalization plan

Ames Watson identified three core areas from the company’s research that it believes are central to a Claire’s rebirth: merchandising, labor and marketing. At the same time, the co-founders said they’re intent on retaining the Claire’s identity that was so central to millennials.
With merchandising, Berger said the company plans to update the products in the store to reflect current trends while also retaining the classic look of Claire’s products. The new products might include collaborations or exclusives, he added, with the company eyeing a line of products specifically curated for sleepovers.
“I think the merchandising, probably 70% of it is pretty good, but there’s 30% that I think we need to change,” Berger said. “So I think it’ll take us six to nine months for the customers to see that.”
Ames Watson also plans on increasing pay, benefits and training for store employees, including having a dedicated “piercing excellence team” that will travel around the country and train piercers at every store. The piercing stations themselves will also be receiving an upgrade, Berger added.
Finally, the new Claire’s will lean into fresh marketing that connects with the company’s nostalgia and will bring customers along for each new step of its makeover, the co-founders said.
“We’re going to be very, very open with our community about what we’re changing, in the hope that we can really connect with them and build a relationship that lasts for many, many years,” Berger said.

Claire’s co-founders Tom Ripley and Lawrence Berger
Photo: Ames Watson

The co-founders said their strategy with taking Lids from a struggling retailer to a revitalized business is informing the way they’re approaching Claire’s. Ames Watson acquired Lids in 2019 for $100 million and grew the company’s revenue, enhanced its in-store embroidery experiences and raised pay for employees.
For Claire’s, its piercing business is just as central to its brand as embroidery is to Lids because they’re both experiences that customers can’t get online, Ripley said. The framework for modernizing Lids without losing its essential business pieces — focusing on product, experience and people — is the same that Ames Watson plans to use for Claire’s.
“We don’t over-leverage, we don’t outsource the hard work and we don’t flip businesses,” Ripley said. “We roll up our sleeves, do the work ourselves and build for the next generation.”
Ripley said nostalgia is at the heart of the Claire’s brand, and the company is focused on modernizing Claire’s without losing its “magic.”
The storefronts will also get revamps, with the iconic purple carpets getting a fresh cleaning and the presentation of the merchandise getting an upgrade.
“Part of the wonder and fun of Claire’s is the ability to walk in that store, and you don’t know what to expect. You sort of meander around, and you discover things,” Berger said. “We don’t want to change that.”

The co-founders said they hope the rebirth of Claire’s will also speak to the millennial moms who would bring their children to stores. The pair said the company is experimenting with adding products in the store for the generation of women who grew up with Claire’s at its height.
With these changes, Ripley and Berger said they hope Claire’s will reemerge as the major player it once was in malls across America.
“Our hope is that we’ll be profitable from day one — that’s what our investment thesis is and, to be frank, that’s what healthy companies are,” Berger said. “We believe that it’s structured in a way that it should be profitable, but that means that we’ve got to do our jobs right.” More

YouTube TV and NBCUniversal are ramping up for a carriage dispute that could lead to a blackout at the end of the month.
NBCUniversal has never pulled its programming from any video distributor in its history within in the U.S.
YouTube TV said in a statement it will issue a $10 credit to all customers if NBCUniversal programming is off the air for “an extended period of time.”

INGLEWOOD, CALIFORNIA – NOVEMBER 17: A detail view of a NBC Sunday Night Football video camera during the first half between the Cincinnati Bengals and the Los Angeles Chargers at SoFi Stadium on November 17, 2024 in Inglewood, California.
Ric Tapia | Getty Images Sport | Getty Images

YouTube TV subscribers may soon be without “Sunday Night Football,” “The Voice” and other NBCUniversal programming as the parties ramp up for a carriage dispute that could lead to a blackout at the end of the month.
CNBC reported the two sides could be headed for a potential blackout earlier Thursday. It’s a sign of YouTube’s relatively newfound muscle in streaming and television.

YouTube TV has about 10 million subscribers, according to people familiar the matter.
NBCUniversal said in a statement that YouTube TV “has refused the best rates and terms in the market, demanding preferential treatment and seeking an unfair advantage over competitors to dominate the video marketplace — all under the false pretends of fighting for the consumer. The result: YouTube TV customers will lose access to NBCUniversal’s premium programming.”
Starting Thursday night, NBCUniversal will begin running messages for YouTube TV customers alerting them to the impending loss of networks if a deal isn’t reached.

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NBCUniversal has never “gone dark” in its history in the U.S., both under the ownership of Comcast and General Electric before that, according to a company spokesperson.
YouTube TV issued its own statement Thursday, saying, “NBCUniversal is asking us to pay more than what they charge consumers for the same content on Peacock, which would mean less flexibility and higher prices for our subscribers. We are committed to working with NBCUniversal to reach a fair deal for both sides ahead of our current agreement expiring on September 30. If their content is unavailable for an extended period of time, we’ll offer our subscribers a $10 credit.”
Disclosure: Comcast is the parent company of NBCUniversal, which owns CNBC. Versant would become the new parent company of CNBC upon Comcast’s planned spinoff of Versant. More