Archived Head of Target's Grocery business Steps down...

[Life201]

The Target executive tasked with turning around the retailer’s so-so grocery sales is stepping down after less than two years on the job.

The Minneapolis Star-Tribune reports that Anne Dament, Target’s senior vice president of grocery merchandising, is making her exit only 18 months after being a marquee hire by then-new CEO Brian Cornell.

When Cornell took over the reins as top exec in 2014, one of his goals was to reinvent Target’s grocery business, which makes sense when you look at his background at Safeway, PepsiCo, and Sam’s Club. Dament had been a colleague of Cornell’s at Safeway.

Full article here:

Head Of Target’s Grocery Business Steps Down Amid Lackluster Results

 

[BoxCutter]

From the Fortune article:

"It’s clear food is meant to simply be a complement to what Target customers are shopping for.

“It’s not one of our signature categories nor will it be,” Cornell said in September. 'We’re not a grocer.'"

Then why does The Board hirer someone who has spent most of his time at Safeway, Pepsi, and Sam's Club?

The margins on groceries are razor thin (except for in-house brands) and supermarkets and Walmart will always do a better job with it than Target.

Target is totally out of their depth when it comes to market. Run it like a complement and stop trying to convince guests we are a grocer.

 

[Flabbergasted]

From the Fortune article:

"It’s clear food is meant to simply be a complement to what Target customers are shopping for.

“It’s not one of our signature categories nor will it be,” Cornell said in September. 'We’re not a grocer.'"

Then why does The Board higher someone who's spent most of his time at Safeway, Pepsi, and Sam's Club?

The margins on groceries are razor thin (except for in-house brands) and supermarkets and Walmart will always do a better job with it than Target.

Target is totally out of their depth when it comes to market. Run it like a complement and stop trying to convince guests we are a grocer.

Agreed. It's all about perception. People do not look at Target as a grocer, and trying to make grocery a huge thing has always been a mistake for this reason. In a similar vain as McDonald's trying to introduce healthy food. Most people don't go to McD's for health food, most people don't go to Target for their groceries. That's it.

 

[HRZone]

Good points, Brian said they were going to try to invest more in grocery but that just seemed like a loser. Company is better off at sticking to what they do best. Cute knick knacks that appeal to suburban housewives.

 

[Hardlinesmaster]

Spot needs to give up the payroll hours to do pfresh to maintain a freshness option in order to compete with Wally world.

 

[SFSFun]

While it's not mentioned specifically in that article, the job responsibilities have for now been handed to the chief merchandising officer, Mark Tritton. And he is also handling some of the responsibilities of the chief digital officer, who left in September. So that's one executive handling the job responsibilities of 3 people.

I think he's about to find what it's like for us at the store level to try and do multiple people's jobs at the same time.

 

[BackroomAlpha]

Lol does that mean the new grocery roll out goes back to normal?

 

[BoxCutter]

While it's not mentioned specifically in that article, the job responsibilities have for now been handed to the chief merchandising officer, Mark Tritton. And he is also handling some of the responsibilities of the chief digital officer, who left in September. So that's one executive handling the job responsibilities of 3 people

"Mark, cleanup needed in aisle A32, A34, G11, B7, G20, D23 ...."

 

[smashandthrash]

The folks in the food distribution network must be thrilled at the news and Cornell's remarks.

 

[BullseyeBabe]

What will this mean for those of us at Super Targets?

 

[Life201]

Agreed. It's all about perception. People do not look at Target as a grocer, and trying to make grocery a huge thing has always been a mistake for this reason. In a similar vain as McDonald's trying to introduce healthy food. Most people don't go to McD's for health food, most people don't go to Target for their groceries. That's it.

And people don't see grocery shopping as an enjoyable experience - they want to go down the aisles & find the things they need & finish as quickly as possible. Constantly changing the inventory they carry & moving products from one spot to another discourages people from feeling it is going to be an easy or a successful trip. If I can only find 2 out of 50 items I need, I'm just going to head to my grocery store & not waste my time searching the aisles in Target.

And the more time & energy people waste searching for their grocery items, the more tired they are & the less likely they are to check out other areas of the store.

 

[Greenandred]

Today, I threw out lots of salad and rotten potatoes. Do you think they would consider closing P-Fresh and going back to just carrying limited dairy and freezer. It would be expensive considering all the money that was invested in the concept. However, it could happen. Target needs to thoroughly analyze which items sell chainwide with minimal waste.

 

[Redzee]

When target abandons both grocery dry and frozen, dairy and meat it tanks.

 

[phibot]

Damnit, Dament

 

[walleyeman]

would converting all the super targets in pfresh targets help or closing all of the super targets

 

[qmosqueen]

We should sell it off to Krogers. Just like pharmacy is cvs.

 

[eightrats]

omg how interesting... what about cheese/Dairy being sold with some having very old exper dates?? chunk cheese that exp in 2015?? and half gallon milks with exp dates of the prev week? I recently did some shopping in Target on my off day and encounters these frightening discoveries in the refr aisles...

 

[Xanatos]

Hehe I spent an hour in the dairy cooler last week and found 31 different locations with at least one expired item and had the market TM pull/QMOS them; he said 75% of it wasn't even located. Did it again yesterday and had enough expired product to overflow a 3 tier cart.

That's just my store's issues (no one is short dating anything in the backroom), but I would love to see something change with market - either go at it full force with the payroll to back it up (I couldn't type that with a straight face) or back off and reduce the costs by getting rid of certain products that just don't sell.

 

[BackroomAlpha]

We should sell it off to Krogers. Just like pharmacy is cvs.

Noooooo

 

[Stubio]

Perfect timing after the market rollout, what the hell is going to happen now?

 

[qmosqueen]

omg how interesting... what about cheese/Dairy being sold with some having very old exper dates?? chunk cheese that exp in 2015?? and half gallon milks with exp dates of the prev week? I recently did some shopping in Target on my off day and encounters these frightening discoveries in the refr aisles...

What we need to do is go to another target close by fill a shopping cart up with all expired product then go to check lanes hold up line
.
when the cashier scans 1 product tell him to check the experation date then say no it's Expired I don't want that can you get me another for each item. Lol.

 

[tellmeaboutatime]

Kill pfresh as we know it. Use that space for ship to store,ship from store or online purchase area where a guest can actually place an order in store with help available. Currently we haven't added any space for the first two and we just steal the area from the backroom However backroom needs their space....all of it..

.

 

[BoxCutter]

To lose that many executives in a relatively short time is not good. One can only feel that something is terribly wrong at corporate. My guess is that, depending on how well the company does this holiday season, we may be seeing a new CEO next year.

 

[mammoth]

To lose that many executives in a relatively short time is not good. One can only feel that something is terribly wrong at corporate. My guess is that, depending on how well the company does this holiday season, we may be seeing a new CEO next year.

I personally would not mind seeing a new CEO step in. Brian has not done much of worth.

 

[Deli Ninja]

We should sell it off to Krogers. Just like pharmacy is cvs.

Lol, while it might or might not be nice... it'll never happen. Kroger is unionized and unions are to Target as sunlight is to vampires.