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See Ya Target Eh!

Discussion in 'Sports and News' started by Boom_70, Jan 15, 2015.

  1. Boom_70

    Boom_70 Well-Known Member

  2. Iron_chet

    Iron_chet Well-Known Member

    My wife was hired for startup before her entire team was let go. She recruited and hired many of the store managers across the country. I e-mailed her this article which she could have written as she had said the same things for over a year.

    International Assignees or IAs - these are key Team Members from the U.S. at various levels of leadership who came to Canada for a "limited timeline" under the guise of helping set up the stores and teams for success. Instead, we found that these folks were not guides or resources, as much as they were obstacles to progress. If it didn't come from/work in the U.S. then it was not a discussion point. To come to a country as large, demographically and regionally different as Canada, and assume that the same "playbook" used in the U.S. would work in Canada was incredible. The inability of the "IAs" to think and work beyond this led to us attempting to Xerox the U.S. store culture (for Team Members and Guests) instead of develop one that is tailored to Canadian tastes and attitudes. As things began to go downhill, the IAs were extremely pointed, and openly opined that the Canadian Team Members worked "differently & less hard" and overall "took less accountability" than they were used to in the U.S. That was an exact quote that came from my boss (an IA himself). Many of these IAs were scheduled to return to the U.S. this year... And most have been asked to remain. So much for the claim that the Canadian Target business be "run and operated by Canadians".

    Why Was Target Canada Such a Disaster?
     
  3. JR

    JR Well-Known Member

    1) The Zellers stores they took over were in second tier malls.
    2)Stores were smaller than Target US stores. As a result, stock selection wasn't nearly as broad as in the US
    3) Pricing was all wrong..Universally perceived as far too high
    4) Chain supply system was a disaster. Stores had empty shelves.
    5) They opened 133 stores in a year. Way too aggressive with little planning
    6) Cultural differences. As Iron mentioned above plus corporate shit like calling customers "guests" .
    7) Immediately after their launch they were behind the 8 ball and never recovered
    8) Arrogance
     
    Last edited: Jan 17, 2015
  4. Vombatus

    Vombatus Well-Known Member

    How do they pronounce Target up there?

    Tar-get, as in something you aim at, or like the French, Tar-zhay?
     
  5. Boom_70

    Boom_70 Well-Known Member

    "CLOSED"
     
  6. Twirling Time

    Twirling Time Well-Known Member

    Isn't Target headquartered in Minnesota? That's practically Canada already.
     
  7. canucklehead

    canucklehead Active Member

    You have to have some pretty exceptional crap to get my family to switch from Walmart, where we have gone to buy our crap for years.
     
  8. JR

    JR Well-Known Member

    The problem at Target wasn't whether it was exceptional crap. It's just they didn't have enough to buy.
     
  9. Boom_70

    Boom_70 Well-Known Member

    I was under the impression that Canadians preferred to pay more to support the local ma / pa operations instead of
    supporting the big US box stores and that is why Target failed.
     
  10. exmediahack

    exmediahack Well-Known Member

    "People start off stories with, 'I was shopping at Target and..' "

    No one ever says, "I was shopping at Walmart and...'.""
     
  11. three_bags_full

    three_bags_full Well-Known Member

    I would submit there are far better stories that star with, "I was shopping at Walmart and ..."

    The peopleofwalmart site is proof.
     
  12. JR

    JR Well-Known Member

    Read my post above. Big box stores do well in Canada. Home Depot, Costco and Walmart are examples. Target failed because they got just about everything wrong. It's got nothing to do with why lots of people support independent stores.
     
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