The article was written like a forum response, with language like "doom it to irrelevance" that, to me, made it come off as biased - not unlike the buzzfeed or Huffpost type photos of sad, empty shelves that circulated a few months ago.
I am not saying that Target wouldn't say the launch was a disappointment - they have been quite clear on that - but they didn't expect to be profitable either. So now that Canada is sucking money away to support new store openings and fix supply chain issues, articles like this are predicting they will close up shop entirely? After one year? Wal-mart did go through similar issues of adjusting customer expectations, especially in the way they took over existing Woolco stores. It wasn't until they got rid of the really bad locations, moved into larger stores, figured out the market, and built the Canadian head office that they became firmly established. It did not happen in a year.
It's true my impressions are "anecdotal" - but they are based on visits to quite a few stores in the past two weeks (Bramalea, Shoppers World, Milton, Burlington Appleby, Niagara Falls, Cloverdale) so not really one-offs.
In terms of merchandise, I haven't noticed much difference between the designer ranges stocked in the US vs. Canada. All of the 'signature' ranges are in the Canadian stores. However, I have noticed that the size of the stores dicates how much they carry...Milton is a tiny store and as such, they are missing quite a few of the lines.
How is the commentary biased? You specifically mention language like "doom it irrelevance". What the article said, in its summary, is "Target is pursuing an outdated business strategy that could doom it to irrelevance". It then went on to explain how Target Canada has no online strategy whatsoever, and in building a new chain from the ground up it chose to follow an early 1990s model rather than a 2010s one. How is that not fair commentary? You don't need to agree with it, but that doesn't make it biased.
As for the photos on Buzzfeed and Huffpost, tales of the empty shelves at Target Canada were in practically every media outlet in the country, even making their way into U.S. media. It's not bias to report facts, and if photos/reports of empty shelves are biased, then the whole media must be biased. Target itself has admitted that its shelves were often empty and that it had serious supply chain issues. Is Target also biased (against itself)?
As for "they didn't expect to be profitable either" - that's just not correct. Target expected to be in the black by the fourth quarter of 2013 (having opened its first stores in March 2013). By January 2014, profits at Target Canada were predicted to be "years away", and it suffered a $941 million loss in its first year (Wall Street Journal says the loss was actually $1.6 billion).
Wal-Mart Canada, in contrast, *was* profitable in the fourth quarter of 1994, their first year of operation in Canada. All the issues you describe are simply
the ways in which the successful Wal-Mart
became even better and more competitive after its first year. In contrast, Target Canada is trying to climb out of a hole. The experience of the two chains is completely different.
As far the goods stocked at Target, glad that you're finding what you want. But it seems most other people are not. As for the stores being smaller, that is an issue. The average shopper was expecting to see the same range of goods that the see in Target stores in U.S. - they don't give a flying f*ck about the GFA of the stores in Canada. That's the problem. I don't blame Target executives for the smaller stores, but it's nonetheless contributing to their overall problems in the Canadian market.
Having said all that, I don't mind Target (I never thought Target in the U.S. was all that great, so I wasn't disappointed by the Canadian version), and I shop there occasionally. I have no doubt that it is a work in progress, that they are working hard to improve the situation, and unlike some others I don't expect them to withdraw from the Canadian market (unless things take a really bad, and unexpected, turn for them in the U.S.). I would like to see a strong competitor for Walmart. But the Target performance thus far in Canada has been dismal, and I think it's ludicrous to say that articles that are justifiably critical of the performance are "biased" or have a "hate on".
