If it's destroyed, another retailer will take it's place. I worked at Target back in the day, and I still remember the onboarding videos they showed us. Half of it was ridiculous drivel about how much they love employees and support LGBT and minorities, and the other half was literal anti-union propaganda and fear-mongering. When it came right down to it, Target is just as happy to treat human workers as disposable tools as anyone else. Most every succesful retail company treats workers as unworthy of decent pay, benefits, or even human friendly scheduling.
I used to do extensive data science work with various retailers, including Target, Walmart, and Amazon.
Compared to Walmart, Target is absolutely abysmal on many fronts. The amount of wasted fuel caused by their horrifically inept logistics makes Walmart look like the Sierra Club. And they were the model for substituting low-impact inclusion messaging in place of actually treating workers decently.
I live near Boulder, Colorado, and it was infuriating seeing friends of mine protesting and proudly stopping the construction of a Walmart, while happily shopping at Target and Amazon. People are absolute lemmings when it comes to "feel-good" activism. Hearing my rather hippyish and moralistic friend talk about "Walmart destroys small businesses" while noticing the pile of Amazon packages at her door is absolutely infuriating.
I also live near Boulder (Lyons what’s up!) and also had a really hard time understanding all the vitriol towards building a Wal-Mart when Target is packed day in, day out.
You're right about both - their marketing is really on point. But allow me to propose a few additional reasons for Target's popularity among suburban liberals:
1. Prices are slightly higher that Walmart, which keeps away the most budget conscious shoppers (ie, couponers & low-income people will go to walmart to stretch their money). Because lower-class shoppers are less visible at Target, middle-class shoppers flock to it, and even non-middle class people who can swing it may prefer it because it confers higher social status. (This is also why the common nickname for Target is "Tar - Jhey", aka, "Target" with a fake french accent to mock the aspirational bougieness of the brand).
2. Target has fairly aggressive policies about how long customers should have to wait in line (if there's more than 3 people waiting, the manager is supposed to call a sales floor person up to assist) + a policy on how long checkouts should take to complete (they actually give the cashier a pass/fail score that everyone can see after each checkout, and if the average is too low, it's grounds for dismissal). For the customer, this does mean a faster checkout. For the employees - it means more work interruptions and ultimately more work to do at closing.
3. Target doesn't even attempt to provide certain products and services that are culturally associated with rural/poor America. They don't sell guns, they don't cash checks, they don't have gardening centers.
In my area, Target is far less crowded and has very short waits at checkout because they actually have people staffing the registers.
Walmart will have one cashier at the special register line where they sell cigarettes, during the dinnertime rush when there are 30 people up front wanting to check out.
Then there will be somebody telling you that if you don't need cigarettes, go wait in the massive line at self checkout.
I don't mind paying a couple percent more for goods if they are paying cashiers with that cash so I can go home sooner.
If those same couple bucks are what is keeping the store and parking lot less crowded... I'll take it. Walmart is a hellhole over here.
> Compared to Walmart, Target is absolutely abysmal on many fronts. The amount of wasted fuel caused by their horrifically inept logistics makes Walmart look like the Sierra Club.
I suppose this explains why my orders from target.com always seem to come in an absurd number of separately shipped boxes. Once I ordered a small set of nonperishable grocery items and they were delivered in maybe 7 boxes - including one toasted sized box that held only a single can of tomato paste and an air pillow. It seems to me like they must lose money on many orders.
1. Walmart provides as much data as possible to it's suppliers, and expects the suppliers to use this data to then advise Walmart on projected sales and inventory in a collaborative manner. Target, on the other hand, has a data feed for it's suppliers, which is VASTLY inferior, unreliable, and the data isn't nearly as complete. A few years ago, they switched this feed from one system to another, and didn't think it was a big deal that the new system barely worked. This made the suppliers/CPG companies I advised scramble and have extreme difficulty in planning. The buyer teams at Target didn't care, and still expected the suppliers to do the same analysis.
2. Walmart has a religion of keeping items in stock and on the shelves. It's not easy to achieve, and they drop the ball at many stores on this, but it's CLEARLY not a priority at Target. They just don't have logistics as a core focus there, and it shows. My wife's experience of expecting a core item that was on the shelf last week at Target to be out of stock is typical.
3. Hearing trucking companies describe what it's like to ship goods to Target vs. WM is sad. Truckers charge extra for Target because they frequently find themselves waiting hours, sometimes days, at Target distribution centers to get their cargo offloaded. This NEVER happens at Walmart DCs. When trucking companies negotiate contracts with Target, this is something they have to "bake in". It's horrible when you hear stories from mom and pop truckers who get suckered into doing business with Target.
4. Target coporate vs. Walmart corporate: Walmart corporate has a shocking number of very high ranking executives (often in their 30s) who never went to college and worked their way up from working in stores. Bentonville, Arkansas is filled with these folks. They have a real "gut level" understanding of the stores/DCs and this is probably the only reason Walmart hasn't collapsed into gross mismanagement. Their worst executives have always been external hires. At Target, it's rare to see people who worked their way up internally in high-ranking roles. Much more typical corporate environment there.
Well, wrote a novel anyway. But yeah, that sums it up.
