Target's failure in Canada

[sixshot1981]

Originally Posted by Alexander Quinn

I hate scrolling through Instagram and seeing what our brothers and sisters down South are paying for things. Makes me want to kick a bald eagle in the face.

Oh well. At least this helps justify having an EB Platinum Card. Makes the difference more bearable.

One thing for sure that isn't helping besides the exchange rate is the lack of retail competition in Canada.

[Alexander Quinn]

Originally Posted by sixshot1981

One thing for sure that isn't helping besides the exchange rate is the lack of retail competition in Canada.

It still blows my mind what an epic failure Target was up here. Spends millions upon millions of dollars building new locations and refurbishing old stores, bring in merchandise, hire employees, set up warehouses and distribution... and call it quits within a year. How do you fail that hard, Target???

[sixshot1981]

Originally Posted by Alexander Quinn

It still blows my mind what an epic failure Target was up here. Spends millions upon millions of dollars building new locations and refurbishing old stores, bring in merchandise, hire employees, set up warehouses and distribution... and call it quits within a year. How do you fail that hard, Target???

Target died alot by its own hand. They for whatever reason decided to create their own inventory and POS system independant from the one used by Target in the USA which worked totally fine. That caused empty shelves etc when they soft launched, they opened too quickly and too fast as well.

But the second factor was the customers. To this day I cannot wrap my head around the fact people in Canada expected pricing on par with their US counterparts even though the exchange was hovering around 25% at the time. People stayed away in droves because of it and because of that they did so at their own peril because those who celebrated their departure from Canada have paid the penalty of losing a huge competitor which has allowed Walmart to position itself to an near monopoly. Consumers failed Target as much as Target failed themselves in Canada.

I for one was a loyal Target customer till the end. Some of the best deals Ive ever found at retail came from those stores. I'm still opening Lego sets with my kids I obtained during their famous clearance sales before they left. I hope everyone enjoys the poop sandwich Walmart is gonna give us moving forward.

[random11]

I blame them as the majority factor of their own failure. Zellers had just gone under. It went under for a reason. And target decided to become Zellers 2.0 instead of trying to bring anything close to what the USA variant offered.

For whatever reason Zellers refused to implement a web store not even the bare minimum of an online stock check (Ie “find in a store near you”). And for some idiotic reason Target thought it could get away with the same BS.

It is my strong belief that their lack of an online store front AND their mismanagement of in store inventory (things not getting restocked) were the key factors for their failure.

I do not buy the spin that it was because of Canadian’s expectation of cheap prices. Sure there could have been people that expected it. But I don’t buy that it was a significant factor.

I think it was run by morons straight into the ground.

[Marvellegendsguy]

Originally Posted by Alexander Quinn

It still blows my mind what an epic failure Target was up here. Spends millions upon millions of dollars building new locations and refurbishing old stores, bring in merchandise, hire employees, set up warehouses and distribution... and call it quits within a year. How do you fail that hard, Target???

I think the big issue is that they were in a bad place after the data breach. At the time the Canadian operation was losing money. Rather than stick it out for the long term the ceo saw a chance to cut a money losing operation and improve the balance sheet in the short term but dooming Targets chances for international expansion and future competitiveness. But I guess he got his bonus so who really cares about building a sustainable long term business with you know employees, good distribution and business model etc...

[Darth Cosmos]

You’re actually all missing the biggest reason why Target failed.

Brands.

The brands that Target carried in the USA were not here. People then just kept going to the USA targets to get what they wanted which is even more hilarious.

I’m talking about all the sub brands every retailer like this has.

[sixshot1981]

Originally Posted by random11

I blame them as the majority factor of their own failure. Zellers had just gone under. It went under for a reason. And target decided to become Zellers 2.0 instead of trying to bring anything close to what the USA variant offered.

For whatever reason Zellers refused to implement a web store not even the bare minimum of an online stock check (Ie “find in a store near you”). And for some idiotic reason Target thought it could get away with the same BS.

It is my strong belief that their lack of an online store front AND their mismanagement of in store inventory (things not getting restocked) were the key factors for their failure.

I do not buy the spin that it was because of Canadian’s expectation of cheap prices. Sure there could have been people that expected it. But I don’t buy that it was a significant factor.

I think it was run by morons straight into the ground.

Just to add to this a bit it wasn't Zellers fault so much as it was HBCs fault as the parent company for not doing things like a website or some type of online presence. Let's not forget Walmart Canada had almost zero online presence until Target arrived as well. They were happy doing zilch too.

Their inventory would've worked if they just used the already in place system Target USA used, but some idiot wanted to do their own brand new system that wasn't ready for deployment.

As for the spin about consumers and the expectations of USA pricing. That wasn't so much something Target spun as an excuse but something the media kept hammering them on and set the expectation for consumers. Several prominent business analysts in the industry stated that those rumors and stories killed opening crowds and it kept people away, while not the killing blow it was up there as a reason why. Target also never gave it time to recover, which I think it would've. But then the inventory system is a whole other nut to crack. So much went wrong so fast. If they rode it out it would've been rough but they could've made it.

I'm sure we can all agree though for all the bad that happened Target leaving was a bad thing for Canadian consumers. And yes it was run by morons.

[sixshot1981]

Originally Posted by Darth Cosmos

You’re actually all missing the biggest reason why Target failed.

Brands.

The brands that Target carried in the USA were not here. People then just kept going to the USA targets to get what they wanted which is even more hilarious.

I’m talking about all the sub brands every retailer like this has.

This is also true to a degree. I'm sure some if not all those brands would've shown up here eventually given time but alot of them if I recall had shown up near the end but it was already too late.

Also your right about Canadians still going to Target in the USA, I had friends who kept shopping there instead of here despite the same things being available in Targets here. Maybe just old habits...

Alot of factors why however that may have been an issue, rights, materials and restrictions etc. I have had any issues finding stuff I normally got in the USA targets here so I can't fully say for sure.