there were a bank of 13 cash registers, but only one was manned. the stores had aisles that were 15' wide. the shelves were empty. a huge fail all around
Target: forgets everything about the company and consumers, expects that the name is enough to compete to other store Canadians: why not just go to walmart, ey? Target: *surprised pikachu*
Evil ConCarne> expects that the name is enough to compete to other store I remember their ad campaigns and ads with Carly Rae Jepson and Lil' Twist. It seemed so promising that we'd have a new option for good values, but when they got here, it was just a disappointment.
can i do a quick shout-out to the fellows on the opposite side of the world, i've never been to canada just know it's a more civilised US, best wishes and tabernac to all the Canadians. But i know this stupid tactic with lidl opening up stores in my country without any prior knowledge of how much we spend and how we spend and basically they have cheap meat and annoying tv commercials and thanks to them i had a good laugh when we experienced for the first time Black friday with penny-pinching pensioners fighting on opening day, many were injured, millenials everywhere laughed that we have casualties because of 2$/kg chicken
This video has it wrong, they didn't buy Zellers, they bought out the Zellers leases (real estate). www.cbc.ca/news/business/target-buys-zellers-leases-for-1-8b-1.981132 The only thing of value from Zellers was Zeddy.
Pretty sure i saw my 1st ever crack head on the mini ferris wheel thingy for a loonie at a zellers as a kid. Not sure if it was my 1st, but its defd one of my earliest memories of an adult trying to ride it on our way to get a cheap breakfast 🤷♂️
It's pretty much like that in the US, and I still go just to keep my blood pressure low. The improved shopping experience is worth it. Their interior decor stuff is nicer too. But if it was the same customer service as Walmart, it would be completely pointless.
@@LanceDa510 - Considering that you're talking in the present, and Target Canada has been dead for 4-5 years tells me you're not comparing the same thing.
There's also the fact that Target bought Zellers, and replaced the Zellers stores at the same locations. Zellers was known as "the cheap (as in low quality) Walmart", so Target inherited that reputation with the acquisition.
Except that there was some time between Zellers shutting down and Target coming, so instead of feeling like Target swallowed Zellers, it felt more like it came to the rescue after Zellers died. It was more that they didn't have the good values we were expecting that ruined them.
@@user-vn7ce5ig1z I didn't go to Zellers nearly often enough to notice the time gap between the two, and to Target often enough to know the difference between the two stores. So it felt more like a name change to me. Your mileage may vary, of course.
I heard Target in the USA had low prices. When they came to Canada, I checked them out. A plastic water jug was $26. It was worth about $2. I never went back.
Very True. I watched a few videos about Walmart shoppers here on youtube. I always wonder..... damn.... NEVER seen anyone looking like that at Walmart Canada. I've been in many right across the country.... Halifax to Vancouver. Don't think I've ever seen a Canadian at Walmart who is 375 lbs wearing pink flamingo g-string panties over her yoga pants while her man rides around on his mobility scooter with his hairy belly hanging over the side. Just not that common up here eh? HA
I've never really felt there was a significant stratification in the Canadian general merchandise sector. Whether it's Canadian Tire, Walmart, or even smaller competitors like Giant Tiger, it seems like you could easily have a lawyer and a labourer next to each other in line. I think the greatest commonality in the Canadian market is we're all kind of cheap, or frugal. Practical would be another word. We don't like to overpay for a product we see as equivalent.
Wow, I never knew this. I bet the Walmart execs didn't either. Walmart in the US knows their customers are lower class and plays with their time. Too many times I've been there having to maneuver my broken cart around pallets in the middle of the ilse thinking, "it's worth it to be here this late, since I'll avoid the wait." Then I go to check out and there's only 2 lanes open and they closed the self checkout. That's a 10-15 minute wait, at 10pm. This never happens at Target. The new Neighborhood Walmart grocery stores are pretty good though, but it's just groceries and pharmacy.
It was basically a more expensive version of its American self. Many Canadians do shopping in America and are familiar with Target, but Canadian target just wasn't it. They should have maybe only started with 5 or 10 stores in each big Canadian city, and slowly expanded after.
@@thedailylifeofjay3822 That's not how you build a market presence. Hit the big towns first. That's what literally every company does when they come to a new area. They go to Metrotown or Eaton Centre. But it might be an idea worth trying, who knows.
@@desp8161 That's not how you build in Canada. Toronto first policies have always failed. Cities in the East like Quebec, Montreal, Halifax, St Johns, Moncton all could have supported the business. My Moncton store was quite popular.
The reason why Target couldn't make it in Canada is the same reason why they will never really compete with Walmart. Target doesn't control their own Distribution warehouses and shipping. Target uses three different contractors for shipping. This is why they are always out of certain items.
As a Canadian I can say target had the same stock as Walmart or less and cost more it had nothing going for it not quality or pricing. After going once I never went again as they didn’t have any benefits
If I remember correctly, Target didn't buy Zellers, it took over the leases on the Zellers stores which meant that because it wasn't technically a takeover, it wasn't required to provide employment to all the Zellers workers. This contributed a lot to the bad first impressions.
I work at a Lowe's that took over a target that took over a Zellers haha. But a chunk of our staff that we got from target had been from Zellers before that. So must just depend on the location.
Why should the Zellers employees be offered a job at Target? If a Taco Bell shuts down and a Chipotle moves in, Chipotle can do what they please with their own operations.
@@lukerinderknecht2982 It's more complicated than that. If Chipotle were to outright buy all of Taco Bell, not simply take over a location which had already closed, Chipotle would be required by law to provide employment to all employees of the now-defunct Taco Bell corporation. That's the way things usually work and people in Canada saw it as a dick move when Target found a loophole and took over in a way which allowed them to leave hundreds if not thousands unemployed.
@@JacobShekter but Target didn't buy Zellers. Zellers was in financial turmoil. HBC was looking to shut it down. Target just got the locations, they have no obligation to what was HBC's mess.
@@lukerinderknecht2982 That's what I've been trying to explain and what the video didn't mention; they did exactly what you're saying they did and people were upset about it because it wasn't very nice.
Target failed in Canada because they didn't listen to what Canadians wanted from them, period. We had a Zellars & a K-Mart. They failed due to high prices. We wanted _different_ stuff that y'all have in Texas & California BUT at Wal-Mart prices. They ignored us & left.
@@jasenrock I know right?? They kept the same crappy stock & prices too. Destined to fail is an understatement. Heck personally giving _me_ 1/2 that money would have made them more. HaHa!
@@SurprisinglyDeep- There was one in Lower Sackville NS, up until 25 years ago or so. Also, one in Bayers lake 20ish years ago, bought out by Zellars & then Target & now is a Canadian Tire. They weren't cheap or good. Not like they are in the US. I'm old I remember lol.
I don’t think there is one person in Canada that doesn’t miss Zellers, it was a place that was just generally better then Walmart, and yet. It felt like Target took something away from us that we all had grown to love. I don’t know about the Zellers at 1:01 but, ours were great with good customer service. Much better then Target was in that department.
I agree that losing Zellers was frustrating, but I don't think it felt like betrayal that Target was taking it over; there was enough time between the two events that it felt more like Target was coming to the rescue after the loss of Zellers. It was mainly the disappointment of not having lower prices that killed them.
Canadian here: I don't miss Zellers at all, I just regret that they weren't better competition for Walmart. (I'm guessing your local store didn't have spilled pudding from a year ago on the shelves...)
0:08 yeah it probably was a bad I idea to start by opening stores in Deline - Northwest territories, Naujaat - Nunavut and in the middle of literally nowhere in northern Quebec... :P
Before target came to Canada I had shopped in their US stores. It was always a kind of fun thing to do when crossing the border. Prices were good, better products then Walmart and they had items that we didn't have in Canada. When target opened in Canada, I think most Canadians were pretty excited but it was quite apparent early on that these stores weren't the same as the American ones. Prices weren't competitive and the shelves were often empty. It looked like it was going out of business already. After the initial hype there was no reason to go there over the regular walmart we were used to. It was crazy because they built all of these massive new stores seemingly over night and they closed them just as fast. The one in my town still is sitting empty and from what I've seen elsewhere that is not uncommon. A lot of towns are just now finding new tenants for their properties. Also you could've asked any Canadian at the time and they would have told you that zellers was not worth anything close to 1.8 billion.
Apparently Walmart was interested in purchasing Zellers, and HBC turned to Target and started a bidding war between the two of them. Turns out Zeddy was the one laughing all the way to the bank.
Sorry for late comment from a Canadian. A few additional facts/corrections: Target USA did not wish to spend money to update its existing finely tuned software to run in Canada (bilingual, canadian dollar, metric, tax issues), so they had to start from scratch and they went for SAP, a heavy software that takes years to setup properly. The stocking issue was NOT a software problem, it was a management problem. Analysts were judged based on percentage of items that were deemed "in stock", so they turned off the antomatic notificatiosn of items being out of stock in order to avoid being punished for having "out of stock" items in the report. As a result, wharehouses were full, but stores empty. Because SAP had so many problems, nobody noticed that feature turned off and they were focusing on fixing known problems in loading inventory. But had management not punished analysts for out of stock items, they wouldn't have turned off the feature and they would have been aware of the problem fo out of stock from their own reports, instead of media reports of people complaining about empty aisles which didn't show up on their fancy SAP reports.
ItsMaple ! Exactly. Just the other week, I was at a Walmart near Vancouver and overheard a few American visitors remark on how nice it looks compared to US Walmart.
What about a video about Target (US) vs Target (Australian)? 2 completely different companies, with the same name, same logo, and same business niche that have no relation to one another.
Video: Target made a string of miscalculations to the tune of Yackety Sax Thumbnail: Canadians rejected everything Target stands for, to the tune of Oh Canada
Another major problem was Target not having an online retail sales site. It was a study in going way out of your way to do everything dead wrong. Most of us were left utterly confused by Target's decisions.
I remember trying to buy a cheap floor lamp at Target in Red Deer Alberta. All they had was a display model, which they refused to sell because "then we won't have any left". Never even went into a Target again.
It also didn't help that Target's brand means basically nothing to a lot of Canadians. They were relying solely on brand recognition from people who like cross-border shopping while not actually delivering what their niche liked about them. As for everyone else? Why would I go to a knock-off Walmart in the first place?
I was pretty close privately to the manager of the nearest location to my place back when Target was here and for pretty much as long as I knew him he was saying how much of a dumpster fire this whole thing was
There was a Zellers at Square One mall in Mississauga, the second largest mall in the country. Problem was that Walmart was already one of their anchors. Target made it super easy to do a price comparison by going in there. I wanted to buy a Keurig so I checked Target and then Walmart and found Walmart was selling it for $20 less. Target essentially took Canadians for granted. They assumed that because we flocked to Target in the US we would do the same here, no questions asked. Except that in the US they had the inventory we wanted and they competed on price with Walmart. When they came to Canada they didn't have the inventory, and even when you could find it, it was always significantly more costly than at Walmart.
No, the lesson is establish a solid supply chain and focus on long term, strategic growth and not shareholder greed. It was literally said in the video yet the ending comment is about first impressions. With over 70% of consumers already familiar with the brand from the U.S. model, the first impression was already established. What wasn't established was how to get the top 5,000 SKUs which sell well in the U.S. into Canada with the similar pricing structure. 🤔
I lived near a Zellers which was awesome, then it turned into a Target which was adequate, now it's a Lowe's Hardware Store that I never visit... it sucks when the neighborhood goes into a long decline
These lessons for Target Canada were learned hear in Australia. So much so that Woolworths followed the plan exactly when opening a big box stores to compete against Bunnings and emulated the results of Target Canada exactly!
As a Canadian I must add all the things Target did Wrong: 1. Came in with no knowledge of Canada and our beliefs and what makes us different (forgot their research) 2. Same stuff sold in Walmart with 2X the price. cheaper to cross the border and shop at American targets. 3. Came in opening too many stores at once 4. Should of never bought Zellers (Canadians LOVED Zellers) 5. Walmart doesn't have that "Low Class" reputation here like the US does, so there was no need to open a more "higher class" store?? People no matter their income come and shop at Walmart.
I remember applying to a job at the local Target a week or so before they announced that they were closing all their stores...they could've just SAID they didn't want me to work there!
They made a couple key mistakes: - they assumed Canadians shopped in a bubble. As shown by the survey, many Canadian shoppers had experienced the US Targets and viewed them favorably, but the US pricing and selection (which contributed to that positive view) did not translate to Target Canada. They assumed because of the exchange rate and smaller economies of scale that Canadians would accept a lower selection at higher prices - Walmart's positioning in Canada is different than its US counterpart. As other commenters have stated, Walmart does not carry as much stigma in Canada and given their relatively good business, Target needed to come in aggressively to compete rather than assume they could coast on being a more expensive Walmart like they do in the US.
I remember my friend saying when we'll get a Target finally we will have more choices than all the stuff we already find at every other store. Target comes in sells only things you can find at every other store. I like a few of their home brand items and all that room to shop in an almost empty store.
I enjoy shopping at Target when I'm in the US. Target stores in Canada were Target stores in name only. The biggest issue we had trying to shop at our local Target was lack of merchandise (we would have bought stuff, if they had the stuff on the shelves, but they simply didn't). Prices didn't seem as competitive as Target in the US, which we could have forgiven if the quality of some merchandise was better quality than Walmart.
I live a few hours from Canada and go there occasionally. I remembering seeing news about Target closing in Canada, and thinking that I couldn't recall ever seeing a Target in Canada in the first place. I didn't realize they'd only been there for two years.
Me and my sister would walk around target for 20 mins or so every other week. We never bought anything just walked around and laughed at how horrible it was.
Strangely enough, Walmart is also failling hard here in Brazil. I guess we are more fond of the European supermarket chains, like Carrefour, Casino and Dia.
The Ex-Target store near me, is big empty building doing nothing for the mall it's attached to. Also I really think online shopping contributed to Target's fall.
Part of the problem was that during the time that Target set up their stores, their competitors, like Walmart and Canadian Superstore beefed up their selection to be competitive with Target. For instance, Superstore greatly expanded their clothes selection. When Target stumbled upon its opening, Walmart and Superstore were already waiting to take whatever audience Target might have. To put it into perspective, in my area, there had been a Canadian Superstore since before I had moved there, and Target chose to open only a few stores down. This meant that Target had to persuade long-time Superstore shoppers that Target was better than Superstore.
From the looks of it, the Westons also venturerd onto target turf in the usa and threw everything they had to see what would stick. Stand alone Joe fresh locations and primark locations and jc penny store with a store concept. Primark stuck.
There is a YT channel called Company Man who makes videos about that sort of stuff. If you look in the description of his videos he has a link to his episode idea board where you can suggest that and maybe one day get it made into a video. You may also like some of his other videos.
Actually, the bigger reason was that they were just impatient and didn't want to wait to make a profit. If they had waited a few years until their startup costs were recouped, then they could have made a good profit, but they wanted profit right away, so they had to keep costs high which made them pointless since we already had Walmart. 😒
You guys are both right. They stumbled at first, but most companies do. They probably could have made it work eventually, but they were looking at short and medium-term profits.
Canada is just a really hard market for foreign companies to enter into, since it's a relatively small country population wise, and also add onto the fact that Canadians are just extremely conservative with where they choose to shop at, not to mention Walmart already filling that role target tried to get into, and you basically get a country who's market is virtually impossible to get into. Long story short, Canada's just a really tough nut to crack for foreign businesses.
I think another problem is that they opened up a lot of stores very quickly very early on in low population areas while where I live which is very densely populated, the people were waiting for target to open for years and had to rely on superstore and walmart while waiting.
I live in a major Florida city where there are more than a few Target stores. I very seldom shop at Target. Almost everything the store sells seems overpriced. I first see if I can find what I want at Walmart. If I cannot, I would search with Google online. Sometimes Target.com might have what I want, but I would look at Amazon before Target. My impression is that people shop a Target store who are not price conscious. They are the game for advertisers, marketers, stylists. I received a refund on a gift card from Target of $20. months ago. I still haven't spent a penny of it.
Honestly it just wasn't worth they hype... We heard from all of our American friends that it was "so amazing" and "so much cheaper" but it was at best marginally cheaper and Zellers was definitely MUCH cheaper... A lot of us Canucks (including myself) were excited to see a souped up, less trashy version of Zellers (they were dumps by the time Target came) but what we got was a Walmart mashed with Zellers in dumpy locations associated with Zellers. I remember going to target and feeling very dissapointed and almost cheated because it was more expensive and I could easily find anything I wanted there for cheaper at Walmart or Costco. They should've marketed themselves as a better version of Zellers... I feel like a lot of the Canadian middle class was hoping for this but was let down
Target failed in Canada because they came with the sole purpose of ripping off Canadians. A Canadian could buy a pair of Levis jeans at Mark's Work Warehouse for $55.00 per pair. Canadians loved the American Target stores, when they vacationed in South Carolina, where they could buy the same pair of jeans for $9.00 per pair. Canadians anxiously welcomed the opening of Target stores in Canada. On opening day, Canadians lined around the block to enter the stores, but found shelves empty and that same pair of Levis jeans selling for $48.00 per pair. The American owned Walmart down the street was selling that pair of jeans for $42.00 per pair. Why would you ever return to a Target store? Canadians are quite used to being ripped off my American companies, but make every effort to minimize the damage. The rip off by Target was just too blatant and obvious for Canadians to tolerate.
I worked at Zellers as a teenager; it was basically the Canadian version of Walmart. When Target arrived, there was a lot of excitement until people tried to shop there. They NEVER had stock; many shelves were empty and people took their business elsewhere. Also, prices were ridiculous. Business schools use this as a case study. This videos nails it exactly.
You know actually listening to sane employees trying to help them navigate Canadian culture might be a start. They didn't. They knew best. Soooo it's no wonder they flopped.
I worked for target Canada in high school for about a year and the entire time I worked there it felt like everyone was half apathetic and half confused. Target Canada was so mismanaged they didn't even have a website with a search engine, customers had to call their local store and ask for someone to physically check for the item. I was the store's phone operator and I had to act as a human search engine haha! I have the disturbing memory of having to find and describe granny panties over the phone to a old indian lady when I was around 16 year old haha!
I was sad when my local Target closed but a Nam Dae Mun grocery store moved into the building. They may not have deals on TVs but they have fruits, vegetables, seasonings, and breads that I’d never even heard of before. Also the parking lot is constantly way more full now.
The problem was they put the store in areas that had a majority of low income households. All the time I went to the Target in area people will walk in look at the cost of all the products and walk out,then take the bus to Walmart.
Many Canadians knew that Target would tank in Canada, before it opened. Canadians crossed the borders to shop at Target because of the low, competitive prices. Canada doesn’t have low competitive prices. And Target thought that their brand was enough to sustain it. Wrong. Canada doesn’t care about brand. They care about prices and quality. Krispy Kreme tanked here too. A lot of American franchises tank in Canada. Everything in Canada usually costs more or they are the same price, when you factor in currency conversion. And we have to pay 13% taxes (on average) on top of it all.
@@volrosku.6075 Pretty much. Zellers was successful in the 70s and 80s, then in the 90s Walmart came in and changed up the game: modern stores, better selection, competitive prices. Zellers was stuck in its ways, and consumers largely moved on.
We kicked Target's ass and showed them who's boss. Woo Canada! 😀 Jokes aside, it was too late. We already had Walmart. Also, because Target had just arrived, they had a lot of startup costs to recoup, so they couldn't keep prices as low as Canadians were expecting, so it failed to live up to the promise of low prices and good values. If they'd been there earlier and already set up, they could've had lower prices (or if they'd just been patient ¬_¬). They probably won't try again for a long time. 🤦
I visited their company headquarters when they came to Canada before the launch, as I was being interviewed to lease a pharmacy in their store (I am a pharmacist and worked for Walmart at the time). I turned down the offer, and glad I did. Most people they had at corporate were 20-40 years of age, many full of themselves. The core issue here is they came in overconfident in their brand and thought that having a big presence would save them. Zellers had about 180 leases, 110 went to Target and Walmart bought out the other 70 or so. Walmarts goal was to be omnipresent when Target came, and it worked.
1:23 in Australia it's more like a deparment store with a small and overpriced range, plus it doesn't do any food or groceries. In fact, 80 stores got closed or converted to Kmarts. And we don't even have Walmart.
As a business student, one of the biggest things I learned is that you never start a price war with Walmart. Only a select few mass retailers are able to pull it off.
I’m from Canada, and Zellers was a dumpster fire for many years prior. It certainly wasn’t worth over $1B. And I’m certain that the shabby reputation of Zellers tarnished the reputation of Target before they even started.
I remember when they closed in 2015. I was 7 years old at the time. I didn’t go to target ever since then until I finally went again when I went on a trip to America in 2019 with my grandparents and cousins
They opened 2 Target stores here. I was in and out in about 15 minutes. It was awful. What they did have stocked was overpriced and the decor was depressingly outdated. It would have been better to replace Zellars with nothing.
Man Target really destroyed an iconic Canadian store for it to fail. Rip Zellers I remember going to you often as a child and when target came and left, it destroyed my neighborhood mall.
Also according to former Target employees, ahem a STL reported they didn't hire local Canadian leaders who knew their market but rather pushed useless Target USA leaders who probably had been kicked to Canada to get rid of them. Most of them were rude, arrogant and unknowing. I called it! Even at their deathbed they still didn't understand why they screwed up and just blamed everything but themselves.
Also I think they completed mis-marketed their arrival to the market. I think Canadians wouldn't have minded as much that that prices were higher and there was selection than the US version is Target hadn't explicitly marketed that their arrival in Canada would provide Canadians access to products not previously available in Canada and at lower prices. Like they continuously hyped this, so of course Canadians were upset when it wasn't true at all. Also, they probably shouldn't have bought all the Zellers locations, a lot of them were small and poorly located anyways.
Actually, I don't think the lesson is "first impressions are everything." It's that if you want to succeed you'd better be prepared to endure a few setbacks along the way and not let those setbacks stop you. Expecting to be profitable in over 100 new stores in under 2 years with new supply chains is a totally unrealistic expectation. No wonder they were sent packing with their tail between their legs. Most Canadians only live a few miles from the US border. It would be entirely feasible to start out with stores just over the border supplied from the US supply chain. Only once they had a solid foothold should they attempt to penetrate further north. They didn't proceed with such caution. Instead they barged in like they knew what they were doing, with an inexperienced whippersnapper of a manager at the wheel. He quickly drove the effort aground and then neither he nor anyone else at the company knew how to get the effort back on track. Poor management from start to finish.
I Honestly thought that they where gonna open day one with prices lower then Walmart to show that they where serious in this game. Then When I went Day one and found that the prices where not that low I checked the prices of Walmart on my phone and went around price comparing things and Walmart had lower prices almost every time. I only ever went to target as it was closer to me and I did not want to go as far then the walmart.
I still remember being a little kid going into one of the Targets in Canada in Regina, Nowadays I didn't realize about target until now and it gives me nostalgia a lot :(
In my opinion Zellers was the Kmart of Canada. Kmart is basically disappeared along with its accusation of Sears and it's related. If you really compare both Zellers and Kmart they both had similar problems
I went into target once while they were in Canada. Shelves were empty, most with literally one of each product. Crap home furnishings etc at a high price. Nothing that they did have was a good deal, different or of good quality. You could literally hear your voice echo in the store it was so bare. Nothing about it made me want to look around and shop there. I’d rather go to Walmart, homesense and winners. They were quite cocky about coming to Canada to be real.
I just got to the end of the video where she says that the subject of this video came from requests in the comment section. A lot of TH-cam channels only take requests from viewers who give them money via Patreon or some subscription service. Thank you for keeping the request line open to all of your viewers.
Yeah I remember going to target with my family and we looked at each other and said wow. This is it? We literally walked in looked around and then walked right out and went to Walmart
A big thing not talked about: Canadian shoppers in general go to specific stores to buy specific things to a much greater extent then the american market, we are far less likely to compromise and get something worse/more expansive simply because we are already there in one store. By comparison Americans often favour the convenience of "everything in one location". In Canada Target had nothing to offer that was unique to it, there wasn't any special product lines, special prices, or otherwise any specific reason why I might pick to go to Target over any other store option available. Wal-mart is the "cheap" store you go to because things cost less.... *very specifically*.
In Cape Breton, Nova Scotia, where I live Target shelves were never more than half full. What a disaster after Zellers which had excellent stores in Nova Scotia. The Bridgewater NS Zellers was my favorite and had lots of outdoor sporting equipment. It was simply a great store in a beautiful river town.
Bro in our city target was the weirdest place ever, there were conspiracies that they were just for laundering money from local owners. We had 2 targets and they were always a ghost town
I liked Zellers. They were kind-of faux Target anyway, with the red-on-white color scheme and similar product range. They sold decently priced white goods / appliances as well, which was nice. I mean, it was low-end name brand stuff, but it did what it was supposed to do. Once the switchover was done, we did go to our local Target and it was OK, but wasn't as good as the US version. I would still rather have gone there than Wal-Mart. What I heard is that they went into it thinking that Canada and the US are almost the same, so they could just wing it. Canadian trading standards are higher / different than the US and they had to reclassify or retest a lot of their products. Also, all Canadian packaging must be bilingual, so that scuppered the idea that they could just restock their Canadian stores with US market goods. They had hired locals to be management, but when they started, they sent seasoned US staff to get the ball rolling, and they were supposed to train the Canadian hires and bring them up to speed. The US staff followed the 'tried-and-tested' US methods, and when they didn't work in Canada, and the locals (who had mostly been headhunted from opposing retail) attempted to help, they were rebuked and called insubordinate and told to toe the corporate line. In the end, it's not surprising it failed, although I wish that it hadn't. They seem to be doing OK in Australia (where they opened around the same time), but they didn't have the bilingual aspect there, and of course they would have to source local markets as they couldn't really plan on bringing everything in from the US.
Close, but not quite. For starters, Target didn't buy the Zellers chain. They bought the rights to many (but not all) of its leases from its parent company. That meant that Target could not transition Zellers into Target over time because it didn't own it, like Walmart Canada did with the Woolco chain when it entered the country. Instead, it meant that the company was under pressure to reopen vacant former Zellers stores as completely new Target locations quickly, without ironing out all the wrinkles. Canadian Business did a much deeper take on Target Canada's failure. It basically came down to a crippled automatic inventory system, weak locations, poorly designed stores, and a product mix that didn't entirely appeal to Canadian consumers. It didn't convey its brand promise well by not promoting its exclusive products well enough and not dispelling the image that its prices were too high. In the end, Target Canada just didn't do its homework and went too big, too fast. It assumed that the Canadian market is like the American market, which it's not.
Target wanted to fail... they had the bus stop in front of the store removed the shelves were half empty prices were no better than Wal Mart They got HUGE tax breaks
A really expensive dollar store. I went around Christmas to do some shopping and they had the same brands as Walmart for a higher price than Walmart. I also waited in line for 10 minutes with only two people in front of me because they had no cash registers open. I ended up finding the gift I'd bought at Walmart later that week for 1/3 less so I returned them from Target, and it closed down before I got around to going back
I've been binging Cheddar videos the last few days and just thought to myself "Oh I bet they did a video on Target CA!" And you guys didn't let me down! Haha.
"Unfortunately, we were unable to find a realistic scenario that got Target Canada to profitability until at least 2021" 2021: *Are you sure about that?*
As a Canadian I miss the time we had Target. It was so nice to do shopping in peace and quiet in an empty store with no line ups.
For real, and you could cause a ruckus and no one would care if you dickered around
Really? In my town they were some what busy.
spongeyboys Thank you. I know I’m very popular.
spongeyboys I’m Pi. I’m sure you’ve heard of me before...
there were a bank of 13 cash registers, but only one was manned. the stores had aisles that were 15' wide. the shelves were empty. a huge fail all around
Target: forgets everything about the company and consumers, expects that the name is enough to compete to other store
Canadians: why not just go to walmart, ey?
Target: *surprised pikachu*
as a Canadian I can say this is complete true just ask my pet moose I'll hold the door open for you come quick wouldn't want to get a cold eh?
Evil ConCarne> expects that the name is enough to compete to other store
I remember their ad campaigns and ads with Carly Rae Jepson and Lil' Twist. It seemed so promising that we'd have a new option for good values, but when they got here, it was just a disappointment.
Sort of dumb for them to think that name recognition would make everything fine. Many Canadians had never been to a target before they arrived.
159 LIKER ON YOUR COMMENT!!!!!
can i do a quick shout-out to the fellows on the opposite side of the world, i've never been to canada just know it's a more civilised US, best wishes and tabernac to all the Canadians.
But i know this stupid tactic with lidl opening up stores in my country without any prior knowledge of how much we spend and how we spend and basically they have cheap meat and annoying tv commercials and thanks to them i had a good laugh when we experienced for the first time Black friday with penny-pinching pensioners fighting on opening day, many were injured, millenials everywhere laughed that we have casualties because of 2$/kg chicken
Wow! I guess you can say they missed their TARGET
Joaquin Bernadez da dum tsss
HAHA Good One xD
Hahhahahahaha.....
Puns....
NO STOP
Bruh
As a Canadian, I can tell you; Zellers was NOT worth 1.8 Billion...
Fake Canadian. Zellers is rad as hell.
This video has it wrong, they didn't buy Zellers, they bought out the Zellers leases (real estate). www.cbc.ca/news/business/target-buys-zellers-leases-for-1-8b-1.981132
The only thing of value from Zellers was Zeddy.
Pretty sure i saw my 1st ever crack head on the mini ferris wheel thingy for a loonie at a zellers as a kid. Not sure if it was my 1st, but its defd one of my earliest memories of an adult trying to ride it on our way to get a cheap breakfast 🤷♂️
Haha they just rebranded Zellers stores
1thingtosay1 Not in its later days
As a Canadian, I can surmise the answer as such:
Same crap as Walmart for twice the price.
It wasn't "twice the price". Nor did it have exactly the same stuff.
It's pretty much like that in the US, and I still go just to keep my blood pressure low. The improved shopping experience is worth it. Their interior decor stuff is nicer too. But if it was the same customer service as Walmart, it would be completely pointless.
Go to a target in the states find those products in Canada that’s not a high end home goods store, good luck lol
I disagree, target prices are honestly not that high, matter of fact you can get discounts like hell in target. And the stuff are actually different.
@@LanceDa510 - Considering that you're talking in the present, and Target Canada has been dead for 4-5 years tells me you're not comparing the same thing.
There's also the fact that Target bought Zellers, and replaced the Zellers stores at the same locations. Zellers was known as "the cheap (as in low quality) Walmart", so Target inherited that reputation with the acquisition.
Except that there was some time between Zellers shutting down and Target coming, so instead of feeling like Target swallowed Zellers, it felt more like it came to the rescue after Zellers died. It was more that they didn't have the good values we were expecting that ruined them.
@@user-vn7ce5ig1z I didn't go to Zellers nearly often enough to notice the time gap between the two, and to Target often enough to know the difference between the two stores. So it felt more like a name change to me. Your mileage may vary, of course.
I can confirm I and the people I knew thought of Target as an American Zellers. The time gap didn't matter to us in the slightest.
If Zellers is very cheap, so are Canadian Target locations!
I heard Target in the USA had low prices. When they came to Canada, I checked them out. A plastic water jug was $26. It was worth about $2.
I never went back.
I'm sorry, did I just read $26!? How!? Why!? Who!??
Like an actual gallon of bottled water?
Walmart in Canada doesn't have the same "low class" reputation as it does in the US. There was really no need for a higher end outlet store.
Very True. I watched a few videos about Walmart shoppers here on youtube. I always wonder..... damn.... NEVER seen anyone looking like that at Walmart Canada. I've been in many right across the country.... Halifax to Vancouver.
Don't think I've ever seen a Canadian at Walmart who is 375 lbs wearing pink flamingo g-string panties over her yoga pants while her man rides around on his mobility scooter with his hairy belly hanging over the side. Just not that common up here eh?
HA
I've never really felt there was a significant stratification in the Canadian general merchandise sector.
Whether it's Canadian Tire, Walmart, or even smaller competitors like Giant Tiger, it seems like you could easily have a lawyer and a labourer next to each other in line.
I think the greatest commonality in the Canadian market is we're all kind of cheap, or frugal. Practical would be another word. We don't like to overpay for a product we see as equivalent.
Wow, I never knew this. I bet the Walmart execs didn't either.
Walmart in the US knows their customers are lower class and plays with their time. Too many times I've been there having to maneuver my broken cart around pallets in the middle of the ilse thinking, "it's worth it to be here this late, since I'll avoid the wait." Then I go to check out and there's only 2 lanes open and they closed the self checkout. That's a 10-15 minute wait, at 10pm. This never happens at Target. The new Neighborhood Walmart grocery stores are pretty good though, but it's just groceries and pharmacy.
Do you guys, like, not have poor people?
@@CharliMorganMusic We do. And we have cheap people.
It was basically a more expensive version of its American self. Many Canadians do shopping in America and are familiar with Target, but Canadian target just wasn't it. They should have maybe only started with 5 or 10 stores in each big Canadian city, and slowly expanded after.
Not big city
But rather small towns with not much options so they can dominate that market.
@@thedailylifeofjay3822 That's not how you build a market presence. Hit the big towns first. That's what literally every company does when they come to a new area. They go to Metrotown or Eaton Centre.
But it might be an idea worth trying, who knows.
@@desp8161 That's not how you build in Canada. Toronto first policies have always failed. Cities in the East like Quebec, Montreal, Halifax, St Johns, Moncton all could have supported the business. My Moncton store was quite popular.
@@thedailylifeofjay3822 Yeah when Muji and Uniqlo did it they failed miserably
@@desp8161 Who are they lol
The reason why Target couldn't make it in Canada is the same reason why they will never really compete with Walmart. Target doesn't control their own Distribution warehouses and shipping. Target uses three different contractors for shipping. This is why they are always out of certain items.
I didn't know that wow
Rockford Illinois had a locally owned store called Union Hall but when Target came to town they put Union Hall out of business. I miss Union Hall.
This is almost like how Wal-Mart failed in Germany but they also had different factors on that too.
As a Canadian I can say target had the same stock as Walmart or less and cost more it had nothing going for it not quality or pricing. After going once I never went again as they didn’t have any benefits
Sounds like target in the US, I don't particularly like the store.
If I remember correctly, Target didn't buy Zellers, it took over the leases on the Zellers stores which meant that because it wasn't technically a takeover, it wasn't required to provide employment to all the Zellers workers. This contributed a lot to the bad first impressions.
I work at a Lowe's that took over a target that took over a Zellers haha. But a chunk of our staff that we got from target had been from Zellers before that. So must just depend on the location.
Why should the Zellers employees be offered a job at Target? If a Taco Bell shuts down and a Chipotle moves in, Chipotle can do what they please with their own operations.
@@lukerinderknecht2982 It's more complicated than that. If Chipotle were to outright buy all of Taco Bell, not simply take over a location which had already closed, Chipotle would be required by law to provide employment to all employees of the now-defunct Taco Bell corporation. That's the way things usually work and people in Canada saw it as a dick move when Target found a loophole and took over in a way which allowed them to leave hundreds if not thousands unemployed.
@@JacobShekter but Target didn't buy Zellers. Zellers was in financial turmoil. HBC was looking to shut it down. Target just got the locations, they have no obligation to what was HBC's mess.
@@lukerinderknecht2982 That's what I've been trying to explain and what the video didn't mention; they did exactly what you're saying they did and people were upset about it because it wasn't very nice.
The image in 1:01 is only 1 of 2 Zellers left in Canada - which now operate as The Bay's clearance outlet. They sometimes have pretty sweet deals...
TheSheiban that Zellers is down the road from me. Super cheap prices (everything is %50-%70 off). It’s a hidden gem
Zellars is amazing imma go there today. So much good stuff where are these two stores theres still one in west end Ottawa
Target failed in Canada because they didn't listen to what Canadians wanted from them, period.
We had a Zellars & a K-Mart. They failed due to high prices.
We wanted _different_ stuff that y'all have in Texas & California BUT at Wal-Mart prices.
They ignored us & left.
@@jasenrock I know right?? They kept the same crappy stock & prices too. Destined to fail is an understatement. Heck personally giving _me_ 1/2 that money would have made them more. HaHa!
Then annex California and Texas
Canadian here, have never seen or heard of a K-mart located in Canada before. Do they have a K-Mart where you live?
@@SurprisinglyDeep- There was one in Lower Sackville NS, up until 25 years ago or so. Also, one in Bayers lake 20ish years ago, bought out by Zellars & then Target & now is a Canadian Tire. They weren't cheap or good. Not like they are in the US.
I'm old I remember lol.
I don’t think there is one person in Canada that doesn’t miss Zellers, it was a place that was just generally better then Walmart, and yet. It felt like Target took something away from us that we all had grown to love. I don’t know about the Zellers at 1:01 but, ours were great with good customer service. Much better then Target was in that department.
I agree that losing Zellers was frustrating, but I don't think it felt like betrayal that Target was taking it over; there was enough time between the two events that it felt more like Target was coming to the rescue after the loss of Zellers. It was mainly the disappointment of not having lower prices that killed them.
Had family working at zellers the business deal was dirty enough for all employees to lose their jobs so I’mma say target sucks
Zellers were all run down dumps. They always had merchandise from 10 years ago still marked at full price. Glad they are gone.
Canadian here: I don't miss Zellers at all, I just regret that they weren't better competition for Walmart. (I'm guessing your local store didn't have spilled pudding from a year ago on the shelves...)
I do not miss zellers at all. It was depressing walking through those stores.
0:08 yeah it probably was a bad I idea to start by opening stores in Deline - Northwest territories,
Naujaat - Nunavut and in the middle of literally nowhere in northern Quebec... :P
Are there even any cities in the territories? I'm pretty sure towns and villages are not a good place to settle as a big retailer.
They didn't. They just put some target logos on a Canadian map as a visual. They are not showing actual locations at all.
@@canadianpoker83 Went right over your head, didn't it?
Before target came to Canada I had shopped in their US stores. It was always a kind of fun thing to do when crossing the border. Prices were good, better products then Walmart and they had items that we didn't have in Canada. When target opened in Canada, I think most Canadians were pretty excited but it was quite apparent early on that these stores weren't the same as the American ones. Prices weren't competitive and the shelves were often empty. It looked like it was going out of business already. After the initial hype there was no reason to go there over the regular walmart we were used to. It was crazy because they built all of these massive new stores seemingly over night and they closed them just as fast. The one in my town still is sitting empty and from what I've seen elsewhere that is not uncommon. A lot of towns are just now finding new tenants for their properties. Also you could've asked any Canadian at the time and they would have told you that zellers was not worth anything close to 1.8 billion.
Apparently Walmart was interested in purchasing Zellers, and HBC turned to Target and started a bidding war between the two of them. Turns out Zeddy was the one laughing all the way to the bank.
@@endeavourist5287 lol target only paid that much because they didn't want Walmart to have it
Sorry for late comment from a Canadian.
A few additional facts/corrections:
Target USA did not wish to spend money to update its existing finely tuned software to run in Canada (bilingual, canadian dollar, metric, tax issues), so they had to start from scratch and they went for SAP, a heavy software that takes years to setup properly.
The stocking issue was NOT a software problem, it was a management problem. Analysts were judged based on percentage of items that were deemed "in stock", so they turned off the antomatic notificatiosn of items being out of stock in order to avoid being punished for having "out of stock" items in the report. As a result, wharehouses were full, but stores empty. Because SAP had so many problems, nobody noticed that feature turned off and they were focusing on fixing known problems in loading inventory.
But had management not punished analysts for out of stock items, they wouldn't have turned off the feature and they would have been aware of the problem fo out of stock from their own reports, instead of media reports of people complaining about empty aisles which didn't show up on their fancy SAP reports.
Also, Walmart in Canada does not have the impressions as it does in America. Stores here are clean, modern and generally the same as Target
ItsMaple ! Exactly. Just the other week, I was at a Walmart near Vancouver and overheard a few American visitors remark on how nice it looks compared to US Walmart.
Yeah. Once I was in Florida and I saw a large woman shitting on the floor off of one of those wheelchair carts.
What about a video about Target (US) vs Target (Australian)? 2 completely different companies, with the same name, same logo, and same business niche that have no relation to one another.
I only just realized they were different. Damn
Video: Target made a string of miscalculations to the tune of Yackety Sax
Thumbnail: Canadians rejected everything Target stands for, to the tune of Oh Canada
They should have had a better business plan than "buy all the Zellers"
Cameron Boyes all except two
Idk if I'd say it's just "first impression are everything", they barely tried. They treated it like the American market, and that was wholey stupid.
Hey Target! Give us Zellers back!
Signed, Canada
Zellers was already dead. As much as we like to be nostalgic about Zellers, we didn't vote with our wallets.
I rather have Eatons back. I guess I can just go to the Eatons Centre in Toronto even though that whole building is now owned by CF.
@@bee5120 The rotting corpse of Eaton’s got bought by Sears but now they’re gone too.
Another major problem was Target not having an online retail sales site. It was a study in going way out of your way to do everything dead wrong. Most of us were left utterly confused by Target's decisions.
I remember trying to buy a cheap floor lamp at Target in Red Deer Alberta.
All they had was a display model, which they refused to sell because "then we won't have any left".
Never even went into a Target again.
It also didn't help that Target's brand means basically nothing to a lot of Canadians. They were relying solely on brand recognition from people who like cross-border shopping while not actually delivering what their niche liked about them. As for everyone else? Why would I go to a knock-off Walmart in the first place?
They just should've never bought Zellers damn I miss Zellers
Zellers was screwed regardless of target. I used to work there.
Your right. The OLD Zellers, circa 1970's. Was a great department store for Canada. I worked for years at Zellers. We had Zellers, Kmart & Woolco.
At 4:11 "Walmart had been in Canada since 1984" while the Walmart cashier is tending a till full of US dollars.
Don't we already have winners and homesense? I never understood why we would even need a target
Same yeah
That thumbnail though 😂😂
This channel is definitely American
Unlike Americans, Canadians aren't too hot about paying higher prices just to shop at nicer stores to avoid Walmart people
samin90 😂
😂
I was pretty close privately to the manager of the nearest location to my place back when Target was here and for pretty much as long as I knew him he was saying how much of a dumpster fire this whole thing was
There was a Zellers at Square One mall in Mississauga, the second largest mall in the country. Problem was that Walmart was already one of their anchors. Target made it super easy to do a price comparison by going in there. I wanted to buy a Keurig so I checked Target and then Walmart and found Walmart was selling it for $20 less. Target essentially took Canadians for granted. They assumed that because we flocked to Target in the US we would do the same here, no questions asked. Except that in the US they had the inventory we wanted and they competed on price with Walmart. When they came to Canada they didn't have the inventory, and even when you could find it, it was always significantly more costly than at Walmart.
No, the lesson is establish a solid supply chain and focus on long term, strategic growth and not shareholder greed. It was literally said in the video yet the ending comment is about first impressions. With over 70% of consumers already familiar with the brand from the U.S. model, the first impression was already established. What wasn't established was how to get the top 5,000 SKUs which sell well in the U.S. into Canada with the similar pricing structure. 🤔
I lived near a Zellers which was awesome, then it turned into a Target which was adequate, now it's a Lowe's Hardware Store that I never visit... it sucks when the neighborhood goes into a long decline
Lmao and then that Lowe's no longer exists
Good gravy, does everything that isn't a Tim Horton's or Princess Tire die in Canada?
@@bcubed72 I saw a Timmies go out of business and my mind imploded
At Centrepoint Mall in North York, Ontario, the Zellers was replaced with a Target, that became a Lowe’s, that’s now a Canada Computers.
Lowe's is awful. I'm glad they really haven't messed around with Rona yet.
These lessons for Target Canada were learned hear in Australia. So much so that Woolworths followed the plan exactly when opening a big box stores to compete against Bunnings and emulated the results of Target Canada exactly!
As a Canadian I must add all the things Target did Wrong:
1. Came in with no knowledge of Canada and our beliefs and what makes us different (forgot their research)
2. Same stuff sold in Walmart with 2X the price. cheaper to cross the border and shop at American targets.
3. Came in opening too many stores at once
4. Should of never bought Zellers (Canadians LOVED Zellers)
5. Walmart doesn't have that "Low Class" reputation here like the US does, so there was no need to open a more "higher class" store?? People no matter their income come and shop at Walmart.
I remember applying to a job at the local Target a week or so before they announced that they were closing all their stores...they could've just SAID they didn't want me to work there!
So you're the real reason they closed down. Jj of course
They made a couple key mistakes:
- they assumed Canadians shopped in a bubble. As shown by the survey, many Canadian shoppers had experienced the US Targets and viewed them favorably, but the US pricing and selection (which contributed to that positive view) did not translate to Target Canada. They assumed because of the exchange rate and smaller economies of scale that Canadians would accept a lower selection at higher prices
- Walmart's positioning in Canada is different than its US counterpart. As other commenters have stated, Walmart does not carry as much stigma in Canada and given their relatively good business, Target needed to come in aggressively to compete rather than assume they could coast on being a more expensive Walmart like they do in the US.
I guess that wasn't canada's target
A truly h _arrow_ ing tale
I remember going to target when I was younger and wondering why there was such a big store for so few people
I mean Loblaws feel the same.
I remember my friend saying when we'll get a Target finally we will have more choices than all the stuff we already find at every other store. Target comes in sells only things you can find at every other store. I like a few of their home brand items and all that room to shop in an almost empty store.
I enjoy shopping at Target when I'm in the US. Target stores in Canada were Target stores in name only. The biggest issue we had trying to shop at our local Target was lack of merchandise (we would have bought stuff, if they had the stuff on the shelves, but they simply didn't). Prices didn't seem as competitive as Target in the US, which we could have forgiven if the quality of some merchandise was better quality than Walmart.
I live a few hours from Canada and go there occasionally. I remembering seeing news about Target closing in Canada, and thinking that I couldn't recall ever seeing a Target in Canada in the first place. I didn't realize they'd only been there for two years.
Me and my sister would walk around target for 20 mins or so every other week. We never bought anything just walked around and laughed at how horrible it was.
Fůck, I really miss the funky ""vintage"" 70's looking Zellers.
Strangely enough, Walmart is also failling hard here in Brazil. I guess we are more fond of the European supermarket chains, like Carrefour, Casino and Dia.
The Ex-Target store near me, is big empty building doing nothing for the mall it's attached to. Also I really think online shopping contributed to Target's fall.
Part of the problem was that during the time that Target set up their stores, their competitors, like Walmart and Canadian Superstore beefed up their selection to be competitive with Target. For instance, Superstore greatly expanded their clothes selection. When Target stumbled upon its opening, Walmart and Superstore were already waiting to take whatever audience Target might have.
To put it into perspective, in my area, there had been a Canadian Superstore since before I had moved there, and Target chose to open only a few stores down. This meant that Target had to persuade long-time Superstore shoppers that Target was better than Superstore.
From the looks of it, the Westons also venturerd onto target turf in the usa and threw everything they had to see what would stick. Stand alone Joe fresh locations and primark locations and jc penny store with a store concept. Primark stuck.
Please make a video on Trader Joe's business tactics and how they are so successful.
There is a YT channel called Company Man who makes videos about that sort of stuff. If you look in the description of his videos he has a link to his episode idea board where you can suggest that and maybe one day get it made into a video. You may also like some of his other videos.
Target failed in Canada because they didn’t understand Canadian consumers.
Actually, the bigger reason was that they were just impatient and didn't want to wait to make a profit. If they had waited a few years until their startup costs were recouped, then they could have made a good profit, but they wanted profit right away, so they had to keep costs high which made them pointless since we already had Walmart. 😒
You guys are both right. They stumbled at first, but most companies do. They probably could have made it work eventually, but they were looking at short and medium-term profits.
Canada is just a really hard market for foreign companies to enter into, since it's a relatively small country population wise, and also add onto the fact that Canadians are just extremely conservative with where they choose to shop at, not to mention Walmart already filling that role target tried to get into, and you basically get a country who's market is virtually impossible to get into. Long story short, Canada's just a really tough nut to crack for foreign businesses.
I think another problem is that they opened up a lot of stores very quickly very early on in low population areas while where I live which is very densely populated, the people were waiting for target to open for years and had to rely on superstore and walmart while waiting.
I live in a major Florida city where there are more than a few Target stores. I very seldom shop at Target. Almost everything the store sells seems overpriced. I first see if I can find what I want at Walmart. If I cannot, I would search with Google online. Sometimes Target.com might have what I want, but I would look at Amazon before Target. My impression is that people shop a Target store who are not price conscious. They are the game for advertisers, marketers, stylists. I received a refund on a gift card from Target of $20. months ago. I still haven't spent a penny of it.
Honestly it just wasn't worth they hype... We heard from all of our American friends that it was "so amazing" and "so much cheaper" but it was at best marginally cheaper and Zellers was definitely MUCH cheaper... A lot of us Canucks (including myself) were excited to see a souped up, less trashy version of Zellers (they were dumps by the time Target came) but what we got was a Walmart mashed with Zellers in dumpy locations associated with Zellers. I remember going to target and feeling very dissapointed and almost cheated because it was more expensive and I could easily find anything I wanted there for cheaper at Walmart or Costco. They should've marketed themselves as a better version of Zellers... I feel like a lot of the Canadian middle class was hoping for this but was let down
Target failed in Canada because they came with the sole purpose of ripping off Canadians. A Canadian could buy a pair of Levis jeans at Mark's Work Warehouse for $55.00 per pair. Canadians loved the American Target stores, when they vacationed in South Carolina, where they could buy the same pair of jeans for $9.00 per pair. Canadians anxiously welcomed the opening of Target stores in Canada. On opening day, Canadians lined around the block to enter the stores, but found shelves empty and that same pair of Levis jeans selling for $48.00 per pair. The American owned Walmart down the street was selling that pair of jeans for $42.00 per pair. Why would you ever return to a Target store? Canadians are quite used to being ripped off my American companies, but make every effort to minimize the damage. The rip off by Target was just too blatant and obvious for Canadians to tolerate.
I miss Target so much ... I drive 45 minutes to the states just to go there
Please stay there.
I worked at Zellers as a teenager; it was basically the Canadian version of Walmart. When Target arrived, there was a lot of excitement until people tried to shop there. They NEVER had stock; many shelves were empty and people took their business elsewhere. Also, prices were ridiculous. Business schools use this as a case study. This videos nails it exactly.
You know actually listening to sane employees trying to help them navigate Canadian culture might be a start. They didn't. They knew best. Soooo it's no wonder they flopped.
I worked for target Canada in high school for about a year and the entire time I worked there it felt like everyone was half apathetic and half confused. Target Canada was so mismanaged they didn't even have a website with a search engine, customers had to call their local store and ask for someone to physically check for the item. I was the store's phone operator and I had to act as a human search engine haha! I have the disturbing memory of having to find and describe granny panties over the phone to a old indian lady when I was around 16 year old haha!
" Expect More Payless " As an Ex Executive Team Leader at Target they believe that motto not only for customers but employees
I was sad when my local Target closed but a Nam Dae Mun grocery store moved into the building. They may not have deals on TVs but they have fruits, vegetables, seasonings, and breads that I’d never even heard of before. Also the parking lot is constantly way more full now.
I’m Canadian, I tried target Canada but their prices were way too high. I’m sure we all thought that and that’s why they failed
The problem was they put the store in areas that had a majority of low income households.
All the time I went to the Target in area people will walk in look at the cost of all the products and walk out,then take the bus to Walmart.
Many Canadians knew that Target would tank in Canada, before it opened. Canadians crossed the borders to shop at Target because of the low, competitive prices. Canada doesn’t have low competitive prices. And Target thought that their brand was enough to sustain it. Wrong. Canada doesn’t care about brand. They care about prices and quality. Krispy Kreme tanked here too. A lot of American franchises tank in Canada. Everything in Canada usually costs more or they are the same price, when you factor in currency conversion. And we have to pay 13% taxes (on average) on top of it all.
The problem was they destroyed a national icon then failed miserably to replace it.
You can blame another national icon (The Hudson’s Bay Company) for the death of Zellers.
@@sblack53 let me guess horrible miss management and languishing locations
Zellers was already dying
@@volrosku.6075 Pretty much. Zellers was successful in the 70s and 80s, then in the 90s Walmart came in and changed up the game: modern stores, better selection, competitive prices. Zellers was stuck in its ways, and consumers largely moved on.
We kicked Target's ass and showed them who's boss. Woo Canada! 😀 Jokes aside, it was too late. We already had Walmart. Also, because Target had just arrived, they had a lot of startup costs to recoup, so they couldn't keep prices as low as Canadians were expecting, so it failed to live up to the promise of low prices and good values. If they'd been there earlier and already set up, they could've had lower prices (or if they'd just been patient ¬_¬). They probably won't try again for a long time. 🤦
ennard_the_clown_boy no
I visited their company headquarters when they came to Canada before the launch, as I was being interviewed to lease a pharmacy in their store (I am a pharmacist and worked for Walmart at the time). I turned down the offer, and glad I did.
Most people they had at corporate were 20-40 years of age, many full of themselves. The core issue here is they came in overconfident in their brand and thought that having a big presence would save them.
Zellers had about 180 leases, 110 went to Target and Walmart bought out the other 70 or so. Walmarts goal was to be omnipresent when Target came, and it worked.
1:23 in Australia it's more like a deparment store with a small and overpriced range, plus it doesn't do any food or groceries. In fact, 80 stores got closed or converted to Kmarts. And we don't even have Walmart.
As a business student, one of the biggest things I learned is that you never start a price war with Walmart.
Only a select few mass retailers are able to pull it off.
I’m from Canada, and Zellers was a dumpster fire for many years prior. It certainly wasn’t worth over $1B. And I’m certain that the shabby reputation of Zellers tarnished the reputation of Target before they even started.
I remember when they closed in 2015. I was 7 years old at the time. I didn’t go to target ever since then until I finally went again when I went on a trip to America in 2019 with my grandparents and cousins
They opened 2 Target stores here. I was in and out in about 15 minutes. It was awful. What they did have stocked was overpriced and the decor was depressingly outdated. It would have been better to replace Zellars with nothing.
Man Target really destroyed an iconic Canadian store for it to fail.
Rip Zellers I remember going to you often as a child and when target came and left, it destroyed my neighborhood mall.
Also according to former Target employees, ahem a STL reported they didn't hire local Canadian leaders who knew their market but rather pushed useless Target USA leaders who probably had been kicked to Canada to get rid of them. Most of them were rude, arrogant and unknowing.
I called it! Even at their deathbed they still didn't understand why they screwed up and just blamed everything but themselves.
Also I think they completed mis-marketed their arrival to the market. I think Canadians wouldn't have minded as much that that prices were higher and there was selection than the US version is Target hadn't explicitly marketed that their arrival in Canada would provide Canadians access to products not previously available in Canada and at lower prices. Like they continuously hyped this, so of course Canadians were upset when it wasn't true at all.
Also, they probably shouldn't have bought all the Zellers locations, a lot of them were small and poorly located anyways.
Actually, I don't think the lesson is "first impressions are everything." It's that if you want to succeed you'd better be prepared to endure a few setbacks along the way and not let those setbacks stop you. Expecting to be profitable in over 100 new stores in under 2 years with new supply chains is a totally unrealistic expectation. No wonder they were sent packing with their tail between their legs.
Most Canadians only live a few miles from the US border. It would be entirely feasible to start out with stores just over the border supplied from the US supply chain. Only once they had a solid foothold should they attempt to penetrate further north. They didn't proceed with such caution. Instead they barged in like they knew what they were doing, with an inexperienced whippersnapper of a manager at the wheel. He quickly drove the effort aground and then neither he nor anyone else at the company knew how to get the effort back on track. Poor management from start to finish.
Yeah, Canadians were expecting the same Target that Americans are used to. When they couldn't deliver on that, it was the end.
I Honestly thought that they where gonna open day one with prices lower then Walmart to show that they where serious in this game. Then When I went Day one and found that the prices where not that low I checked the prices of Walmart on my phone and went around price comparing things and Walmart had lower prices almost every time. I only ever went to target as it was closer to me and I did not want to go as far then the walmart.
I still remember being a little kid going into one of the Targets in Canada in Regina, Nowadays I didn't realize about target until now and it gives me nostalgia a lot :(
In my opinion Zellers was the Kmart of Canada. Kmart is basically disappeared along with its accusation of Sears and it's related. If you really compare both Zellers and Kmart they both had similar problems
I went into target once while they were in Canada. Shelves were empty, most with literally one of each product. Crap home furnishings etc at a high price. Nothing that they did have was a good deal, different or of good quality. You could literally hear your voice echo in the store it was so bare. Nothing about it made me want to look around and shop there. I’d rather go to Walmart, homesense and winners. They were quite cocky about coming to Canada to be real.
I just got to the end of the video where she says that the subject of this video came from requests in the comment section. A lot of TH-cam channels only take requests from viewers who give them money via Patreon or some subscription service. Thank you for keeping the request line open to all of your viewers.
I just remembered target being there and then leaving. I saw it has a low rate Walmart at the time
Yeah I remember going to target with my family and we looked at each other and said wow. This is it? We literally walked in looked around and then walked right out and went to Walmart
I miss zellers so much
Was such a great store
Let's not forget how angry some of us were when Target closed Zellers. Zellers was my favourite department store.
Zellers is kind of back now but only online and as sections in Bay locations. No full stores.
A big thing not talked about: Canadian shoppers in general go to specific stores to buy specific things to a much greater extent then the american market, we are far less likely to compromise and get something worse/more expansive simply because we are already there in one store. By comparison Americans often favour the convenience of "everything in one location".
In Canada Target had nothing to offer that was unique to it, there wasn't any special product lines, special prices, or otherwise any specific reason why I might pick to go to Target over any other store option available. Wal-mart is the "cheap" store you go to because things cost less.... *very specifically*.
In Australia Target and Kmart are owned by the same company and Target is like the more expensive version of Kmart but less popular
In Cape Breton, Nova Scotia, where I live Target shelves were never more than half full. What a disaster after Zellers which had excellent stores in Nova Scotia. The Bridgewater NS Zellers was my favorite and had lots of outdoor sporting equipment. It was simply a great store in a beautiful river town.
0:15 Is that the Paper's Please stamp sound effect?
Target should have rebranded as _ZelTar_ for the Canuckian market
Bro in our city target was the weirdest place ever, there were conspiracies that they were just for laundering money from local owners. We had 2 targets and they were always a ghost town
I miss zellars. It was iconic
I liked Zellers. They were kind-of faux Target anyway, with the red-on-white color scheme and similar product range.
They sold decently priced white goods / appliances as well, which was nice. I mean, it was low-end name brand stuff, but it did what it was supposed to do.
Once the switchover was done, we did go to our local Target and it was OK, but wasn't as good as the US version. I would still rather have gone there than Wal-Mart.
What I heard is that they went into it thinking that Canada and the US are almost the same, so they could just wing it. Canadian trading standards are higher / different than the US and they had to reclassify or retest a lot of their products.
Also, all Canadian packaging must be bilingual, so that scuppered the idea that they could just restock their Canadian stores with US market goods.
They had hired locals to be management, but when they started, they sent seasoned US staff to get the ball rolling, and they were supposed to train the Canadian hires and bring them up to speed.
The US staff followed the 'tried-and-tested' US methods, and when they didn't work in Canada, and the locals (who had mostly been headhunted from opposing retail) attempted to help, they were rebuked and called insubordinate and told to toe the corporate line.
In the end, it's not surprising it failed, although I wish that it hadn't.
They seem to be doing OK in Australia (where they opened around the same time), but they didn't have the bilingual aspect there, and of course they would have to source local markets as they couldn't really plan on bringing everything in from the US.
Close, but not quite. For starters, Target didn't buy the Zellers chain. They bought the rights to many (but not all) of its leases from its parent company. That meant that Target could not transition Zellers into Target over time because it didn't own it, like Walmart Canada did with the Woolco chain when it entered the country. Instead, it meant that the company was under pressure to reopen vacant former Zellers stores as completely new Target locations quickly, without ironing out all the wrinkles.
Canadian Business did a much deeper take on Target Canada's failure. It basically came down to a crippled automatic inventory system, weak locations, poorly designed stores, and a product mix that didn't entirely appeal to Canadian consumers. It didn't convey its brand promise well by not promoting its exclusive products well enough and not dispelling the image that its prices were too high. In the end, Target Canada just didn't do its homework and went too big, too fast. It assumed that the Canadian market is like the American market, which it's not.
Target wanted to fail... they had the bus stop in front of the store removed
the shelves were half empty
prices were no better than Wal Mart
They got HUGE tax breaks
I went to target when it came ot Canada. It felt like a giant dollar store, not the "chic everyday product" store.
A really expensive dollar store. I went around Christmas to do some shopping and they had the same brands as Walmart for a higher price than Walmart. I also waited in line for 10 minutes with only two people in front of me because they had no cash registers open. I ended up finding the gift I'd bought at Walmart later that week for 1/3 less so I returned them from Target, and it closed down before I got around to going back
A lot of Target stuff in Canada seemed to be poorer quality than Walmart had.
I've been binging Cheddar videos the last few days and just thought to myself "Oh I bet they did a video on Target CA!" And you guys didn't let me down! Haha.
"Unfortunately, we were unable to find a realistic scenario that got Target Canada to profitability until at least 2021"
2021: *Are you sure about that?*