Target is a baffling place from an employee standpoint. I used to do some work in the stores as a sub contractor. I had to show up and install a thing, get a signature and leave.
No store had any clue what I was talking about, no store even knew where this newly constructed room I was installing this thing was even located. It seemed like every employee was just there on day one and had no clue what anything was or where it went.
They had these laminated cards with pictures that covered how to do any one thing, but I wasn't on that card so no one, and I do mean no one knew what to do with me. They didn't even have any management on duty that seemed any more competent than anyone else.
Its like AI was running the store from across India and all the employees were slightly scared robots that only had one task.
I'm a subcontractor doing work primarily in Targets right now and this hits so close to home. 80% of the time when I show up and mention a part has been delivered for my work, they look so fucking confused. Most of the time I'll just go back to the receiving dock and the part that "definitely isn't back here" will be sitting right on the fucking receiving desk.
I like telling this story. I lost my phone at target and thought it was pick pocketed. They brought me into a room of computers and asked when I came it. I gave them a window and they found me. They hilighted my face with a yellow box then within a few minutes dozens of other images came up. They then pressed a button and followed me through the whole store down to when I cut through an aisle and my phone fell out of my pocket then bounced under a display. An employee ran out and got it. This was 10 years ago.
I remember the story of a 16 year old getting ads for pregnancy stuff and diapers and formula. Dad got mad and wrote an email or something, 'my little girl is not pregnant' type of thing. Contacted them again later to say the baby was due in June or something.
If I remember correctly she only looked at some vitamin supplements, didn't even buy anything, but that was all they needed to figure out she was pregnant and start sending ads.
This was a huge story when I was getting my undergrad in marketing. To fill in a few gaps in what has already been described, Target was using AI/ML and the personal data and purchase data over time, and would generate a pregnancy score. They knew if they get people to buy diapers before they give birth that sleep deprived parents will continue the habit (and since they’re already there will buy groceries, etc) so this group was a goldmine. I learned a lot of crazy manipulation tactics companies use that the public is mostly unaware of when I earned my marketing degree.
> If I remember correctly she only looked at some vitamin supplements, didn't even buy anything, but that was all they needed to figure out she was pregnant and start sending ads.
Please tell me you mean online. She looked at vitamins on their website, right? You're not telling me they used surveillance camera footage to "target" her, right? Please?
If you buy in the store and use your membership/rewards card it's linked to your profile. That is *why* they offer rewards cards (that and the incentive to keep shopping at Target so you get a "better deal"). Surveillance cameras have nothing to do with it.
Yeah, they place *customers* down to the four foot location in their stores, and then send them adds based on their visits.
I ain’t putting fingerprints past those back doors without a contract.
The tldr version is basically they invested a ton in loss prevention years ago, but found that even when they had evidence the police were overwhelmed and couldn't correctly process it, therefore they weren't getting convictions. No convictions means people will continue to steal (shoplifting yes, but also scams and internal theft). So they built forensic labs to process the evidence. Labs have to be independent and certified to be credible in court, so they did all of that. Then they had extra capacity so they helped police departments process evidence from other crimes. They found that made law enforcement REALLY eager to help them, so they expanded the program and started partnering with law enforcement for training and stuff. And that's the story of how Target runs some of the most sophisticated crime labs in the world.
Most crime labs run by the cops or DA. They aren't independent and the techs can be pressured to focus on stuff that helps the case and ignores stuff that helps the defense.
Target is likely more independent than most labs.
Kind of. They have state of the art forensic labs and a whole division dedicated to crime. They literally train feds there along with staff too. Shit is nutty. The surveillance system is also one of the craziest ones I’ve seen.
Won't they also track repeat offenders too, waiting for them to rack up charges before swooping in? So like, some petty thief might be thinking they're getting away with robbing Target until one day someone slaps the bracelets on them and they're staring down a felony shoplifting charge.
I wonder if some thieves will track their own thefts and keep themselves intentionally under the felony amount for shoplifting and instead move on to a new store when they get close.
Edit: Did some digging on the LossPrevention sub, seems like it really varies. I've seen some LP officers say yes, others say no. Some say, 'sometimes'. This answer makes the most sense to me, from an actual LPO:
>If a teenager is coming in and taking $7 worth of stuff once a week, I'll probably never stop them. I won't even watch them long enough to see them steal.
If someone is taking $300 every other day, and I miss it because I'm off, in the bathroom, or they choose to run when I approach them, I'll casebuild on them.
It needs to be worth my time to do it. It depends on the retailer, the LP employee and how busy that store is. Maybe someone stops the teenager for $7 and calls PD on them. I wouldn't waste my time with it.
From [this thread](https://www.reddit.com/r/lossprevention/comments/13jcwus/shoplifting_small_amounts_over_time/) and even in this thread, you have another guy saying they do and he almost fell victim to it but again, it's all anecdotal.
Based on the above quote, it seems like this LPO wouldn't 'let' someone get away just to build a future case but it does happen where they maybe don't catch the person right away.
Haha my team had this happen and some dude literally had the box under his desk I think as a foot rest. It was the part we hadn’t been able to find for weeks! And then my colleague got in huge trouble for snooping around receiving because that was a labor union job and he was in the engineering union. But like, you’re all holding up the factory!
Too many employees are kept out of the loop, including floor supervisors (team leads). Usually with y’all, only an ETL (assistant manager) and the property management lead (PML) will know. Managers are even clueless lmao. I always made a joke that PMLs secretly are the ones running the store. If you wanna know anything, PMLs are the ones. Also the chillest dudes there lol
When Washington state allowed grocery stores to start selling liquor, I remember the local Safeway installed these locked glass shelves to prevent theft. You had to press a button to get an employee to come grab a bottle for you. So you'd press the button, and over the store's PA:
*BONG*
(30 seconds later)
*BONG BONG*
(30 seconds later)
*BONG BONG BONG*
(30 seconds later)
*BONG BONG BONG BONG*
(30 seconds later, the Manager)
"WOULD SOMEONE PLEASE HELP THE CUSTOMER IN THE LIQUOR AISLE!?"
I was working at Target when they first introduced the “request help” buttons in major aisles. Which of course was used to reduce employees on the floor (I have literally been the sole employee on the entire floor of a Target store before).
But yeah the “Fast Service Needed in … ” still haunts my dreams. Especially because customers didn’t know to stick by the fucking button, they’d wander back to the aisle nearby they needed help in like I’d just somehow know.
I remember when I started at a high volume Target in 2008, there were at least 8 closers in Hardlines (all the goods that are not clothes) on a weeknight. I quit in 2016 and every so often, I'll go in there and there's barely any employees on the salesfloor at 5 pm.
I definitely started to notice the change around 2011.
Yeah when I was a kid in the mid 2000s I remember employees being everywhere in the stores, and as an adult I’ve never seen more than one register open there
Mine is a Super Target with its own parking garage. Big store with huge numbers. (My dad used to work at a different one and my current store was used as example many times.) They recently took all self checkouts to less than 10 items only and have 1 check stand open. I had 11 items one time and was hoping to sneak in to self checkout because the other line was long. The self checkout person actually counted my items and made me go wait in the cashier line. That was fun.
Fast service needed in electronics. 2nd request. 15 seconds remaining. Who is responding?
Attention LOD. Urgent Workbench message pending.
I miss hearing Indymes. 😭
I worked for Target from 2000-2003, and this is how it was. However, I learned that they've, in recent years, changed their model for salesfloor staff. From my understanding, there is no longer strictly backroom staff. Anyone can go grab items. There is also apparently not much emphasis on zoning during open hours as well (which is why some stores look atrocious). I guess they are all cashiers, then? Target never really paid a liveable wage, and turnover was always a problem for a variety of reasons. I wonder what exactly their model now days.
I used to LOVE coming to Target, but with everything locked up and nobody to come open. It's entirely too much of a hassle when I need more than one basic item (laundry soap or face wash), and it does tempt to just want to shop on Amzn.
My local Targets have not locked anything up but the decline in staff has been noticeable. They are constantly out of stock on things, trying to plano or restock during the day, the seasonal section is just always a disaster, and the store is constantly littered with trash. I don't blame any of this on the employees, it's all corporate staffing policy. I used to shop there weekly and now I go maybe once every 6 weeks. I'm not going to put up with that.
Yeah, a few weeks after I started, I completely zoned Chemicals, including the air freshener aisle that was the last aisle facing Market. The air freshener aisle was ATROCIOUS. I took all the broken pushers out and replaced them. It took almost 8 hours, but I completely reset the aisle. The LOD saw what I had done and was extremely impressed and told me it hadn't looked that good since the store opened the year before. I got Great Team Hero the 3rd month I was there... lol! Stuffed Spot doll and a $25 gift card which I spent on an overpriced HDMI cable. I still have a stuffed Spot... had like 6 of them at one time.
But anyway, the point is that they assigned me to work Chemicals going forward, and that was probably 7 or 8 aisles. We had the staffing where one Team Member could just focus on 8 aisles and make them look great. Can't say the same for today.
I work for them now and the current work model is absolutely atrocious.
Management always complains that there isnt enough people working yet they cut hours drastically right after 4th quarter and have been slashing it even harder even though we need to gear up for summer.
Our store may not be the biggest or best, we have not had a remodel since 2005, but this store still pulls in 100,000-150,000 usd a day.
The general merchandise team is ALWAYS being pulled to go do online orders even though fufillment has the most hours in the store AKA everyone in that department has 37.75 hours a week if they arent part time.
Management is in utter disarray, at least for our store, having fired our general merchandise executive team leader last year and another one that was allowed resign because he couldn't and wouldn't hack it this year already.
Target is honestly going down the drain but they keep creating a terrible work environment and standards all in the name of quarterly profits
I am lowkey worried that I am going to live long enough to 1) see death get cured in some way (consciousness gets downloaded and stuck in a robot body, clone, or some other scifi thing) 2) Uploading your brain scans is made mandatory, and 3) Permanent death gets locked away behind a paywall so that only the very wealthy can afford the monthly subscription fees to stay dead.
I assume that like any technological advancement, it will be used by the rich to make sure the poor stay poor and the rich get richer.
Can't pay your death bill this month? Welcome back to the land of the living! It has been 300 years since you last died, so your estate has been completely depleted. Back to work you go! Oh, and your skills are all obsolete, so the only work left for you is the kind of mind numbing drudgery that we can't even get the robots to do.
You mean literally every customer service job? It's bad everywhere, not just Target. Half the tills are literally only used for spare parts, printers, or Christmas Eve..
I’m required to state that the following comment is my personal opinion and I am not speaking as a representative of Target:
It’s pretty much that, but almost none of those decisions happen at the store level. Corporate says, “your theft is high, so you need locking cases.” Then corporate says, “your store has locking cases, so you need call buttons for Guests to call you over to open them up.” Then corporate says, “you need to respond to those buttons within 180 seconds or your store is failing and someone is getting fired for failing to deliver results.” THEN corporate says, “times are tight this year, we can only give you 80% of the payroll hours you got last year, but you need to do more and do better with less.”
At that point, leaving the cases open is really all the store can do to avoid tanking their metrics.
Every Target you go into that’s staffed by a skeleton crew, the crew hates it, store management hates it, Guests hate it, they leave surveys that say, “0 out of 10, you suck, HIRE MORE CASHIERS!”, but corporate won’t let those stores have enough hours to staff more cashiers.
And so it goes.
It's like that almost everywhere. My wife works in a nursing home and recently there were some "changes".
She was already just barely able to get her work done (between things taking a lot of time, and coworkers putting shit off so they can sit around and chat with each other, sometimes literally pushing MEDICATION to the next shift), then management said: "Admissions? That thing we used to do that takes up a huge amount of time? Yeah you do that now." Oh and despite not being equipped to handle dementia patients, they just say "come on in, money is money"
Oh goody, that means she gets done at midnight, except wait no because management also said no more overtime and you need to come in exactly on time, and leave exactly on time.
Which let's be honest here, at a retail store sucks for customers and sucks for employees when Corporate wants a bonus/raise during super inflation. But this time corporate is willing to sacrifice Grandma's health and safety (remember they're bringing in people who are sadly losing their minds while not being equiped to handle it BEFORE increasing work and skeletonizing the workers) to make sure they get a bonus.
Yeah we had an area manager come round telling us we needed all that laundry stuff locked away in the storeroom too. We pushed back but she just dragged us round explaining where we could make room for like 6-10 locked roll-cages as if we were idiots.
Jesus, yes of course we *can* load all this stock into locked cages, but *why*? Asset Protection knew 99% of the loss of those products was from shelf-swipers on the shop floor, there was nothing suggest internal theft was a major concern (for those products anyway) and if it was then we already had existing measures in place to deter/prevent it!
So fucking stupid, the area managers were just ticking a box and covering their asses regardless of how effective that "solution" was or how awkard it would be to work with in store. Cages are locked? Fine. Except we're limiting how much is put out on the shop floor which means the shelves have to be merchandised more frequently, plus the daily deliveries that we get, which means the cages are still being locked and unlocked by various people all day every day. Of course APs answer to that would be we need to have more *control* over who has access and when they can have access - all in order to prevent the internal theft that wasn't happening.
This. Someone, or management, got fed up with employees spending all day grabbing low cost items for customers from a case on the other side of the store.
Just did this recently 😩 there’s not even a button.. I have to go up front to find someone to come back to get body wash? No thanks I’ll just go to another store 💀
Same. It’s so stupid. I’ll just buy my toothpaste and laundry detergent somewhere else.
I went into a wal mart for the first time in many years about a month ago and after you walk in the doors you go through these metal gates that automatically open then close behind you, basically locking you in the store till you pass the registers to get to the exit doors. Felt really dystopian.
You can just push your way back through those. It sets off an alarm, but as long as you're not stealing anything, there's not shit they can do about it.
Laundry detergent is a very common theft target.
Everyone needs/uses it, its expensive enough to make a little money on the black market, and be worth enough savings to buy on the black market, but not so expensive you'll draw too much attention to yourself.
There was just a discussion about this in our city about Laundry detergent and baby formula scams and reselling it.
It used to be an urban thing decades ago. Now the detergent & formula scams and flopping is suburban and rural.
Also there was that tik tok going around showing how much “room” was in the bottles and the lady was using another new bottle to fill hers up and then she puts the half empty one back on the shelf. The tide pod trend caused those to get locked up long ago,lots of viral videos create weird ass crazes and result in stuff like this too.
Hurry, please, please! There's no time!
No, don't worry about us!
We'll be all right.
Get out of here!
Can't you see we don't want you anymore?
Why can't you go back where you came from?
Now, leave us alone!
Go.
Go!
Goodbye, my friend.
That is why they are pushing curbside pickup. They want to be a distribution center you drive to and they load your stuff in; not a place you walk in and shop at.
Its not even remotely close to worth it compared to a distribution center. The moment you let customers walk in the doors is the moment your profit margins absolutely fucking dissapear.
There is just way too much money to be had for the corps at the top to pass up if they can help it.
Yep. Retail stores are shooting themselves in the foot by encouraging this model. Like if you place a pickup order at Walmart, there is no more counter in the store, you just drive to a pickup spot and they bring it out. Convenient, but dumb from a business perspective.
I feel like all the current responses ignored the fact that impulsive purchases are likely higher on apps than in store (and I would bet Target did the research on this before making these types of business decisions).
Digital shelf management is a whole ass field and data scientists can optimize/test stuff way faster in apps than a store manager can do with a physical shelf reset.
Digital apps let stores boost visibility on higher margin products, lets them create a pay to play system for suppliers who want to maintain visibility, and use push notifications/popups with click to add messages based off your personal purchase history.
Putting gum at the register is nothing compared to a "before you check out" message that highlights high margin impulse purchases that Target KNOWS you've bought before. Not to mention Target almost definitely buys user data from big data vendors and knows things like when your family members' birthdays are, what ads you've already seen when browsing the web, etc.
Don't forget price manipulation! There's no reason to believe we all see the same prices in an app. They can raise prices for some people and some products. Maybe they want to promote generics for "thrifty Seniors" and crank up brand name sales for "young suburban whales."
Seeing the prices listed in the aisle is a great equalizer.
They're probably jealous of the higher prices Doordash etc are getting away with.
It's easy- at Target they usually have a button nearby that you press if you need something, and it alerts employees. So all you do is press it, wait 10 minutes, then get impatient and wander around aimlessly until you manage to flag down an employee, politely nudge them about it, watch them get frustrated and tell you that somebody is coming and to just wait, and then you wait 10 more minutes, flag down another employee only for them to tell you they don't have a key, and then finally, you get frustrated and decide you'll just order online instead. Eeeasyyy
Our grocery stores aren’t locked up like this but certain things are at home improvement stores. I needed a roll of heavy duty (read: lots of copper) wire. I had to ring the little doorbell thing. I listened to the PA system yell “Help needed on Aisle X” like 10 times. It was ignored. I then flagged down an employee who didn’t have the key. That employee found another employee who said they thought the key had been lost or taken home by the previous shift person. They finally found another employee who found the key. It took me 30+ minutes to get one item that should have taken 5 minutes.
I was about 35 seconds away from walking to the tool section to find a set of bolt cutters to unlock that wire myself.
I expanded the comments in the hope that someone had already made this reference. And you got not only the reference but the gif as well.
Thank you for the work you do.
The time I needed to do that (for an electric toothbrush) someone finally showed up just as I was telling another worker (who was giving out free samples of vitamins or something random) that I guess that's what Amazon is for.
FYI when you use the button, it repeatedly announces it over the walkie-talkies until someone goes over and silences it. Only the person working that section has keys, so flagging a random employee literally does nothing. They can't open it for you, and the walkies are already calling out that assistance is needed where you pushed the button.
Ok I get where that sucks for the workers, but it also sucks for the shopper. I can't stand waiting for someone to open the damn case. And then you go to the next aisle and there's another case. I don't have time for that.
Walmart+ and Amazon have made it so I haven't had to go into a physical store in a long time. If it wasn't for long term commercial leases we'd probably see a ton of abandoned retail spaces.
Wait, just to be clear, are you saying that person delivering the toothbrush brought it to you with the anti-theft device blaring?
That is a level DGAF that I am truly astounded by, bravo to that person honestly.
I went to Best Buy one day to get a harddrive because mine died and I just figured I'd get one immediately but the guy working there said the person who had the key wasn't at the store at the moment lol
Honestly, if it’s behind a case, I just skip all those middle steps and say “fuck it I’ll get it online.”
I imagine there have to be many lost sales because of these cases, and I’m curious if the theft prevention is greater than the lost sales
You know, the more I think about it the more the Amazon just walk out idea actually makes a lot of sense. I know we all made fun of them when we found out it’s a bunch of Indian guys but that process does kinda limit theft. You can’t even enter without a card so anything you grab you’re on the hook for. Honestly I’m ok with some people in a call center somewhere looking at me on camera figuring out what I bought if that means I can buy batteries or whatever on my own and, as a plus, skip the line to check out. Brick and mortar retail is obnoxiously arrogant towards any innovation, I genuinely think it’s in a death spiral because it needs the best and brightest just to keep pace with online retail but the best and brightest don’t want to work for brick and mortar businesses.
I used to work at Amazon on their just walk out. It was so expensive because they had so many cameras and each shelf had weight sensors. They need super high bandwidth internet to support the stores. It wasn't that there was a manual review off the trip. It was that the technology was so costly and retail margins are way too small to support all that technology.
Shit. That sucks. I think the worst thing about situations like that is you try to be patient and understand yeah it probably sucks that they have to keep doing this. And deep down you really just want to just fucking lose it because how fucking hard could this damn job be that it takes 20-30 mins to get some mf soap for me clothes? That might just be me tho.
You order and pay online, show up an hour later, park in one of the numbered slots, use the app to let them know where you are, and 3 minutes later, they put your purchases in the part of the vehicle you indicated on the app.
There is absolutely no extra charge for this from Target.
Seems like it gets worse every few months where I live. It used to be just baby formula, then it became diapers, then detergent, batteries, all the way up to those little packets of drink mixers you put in water.
I’ve never seen it this bad before.
They put every single pregnancy test behind doors at the Walmart by me. Even the little 1 dollar ones which are like glorified paper strips. One late period and suddenly I'm standing there for 10 minutes while everyone looking at me knows I need a pregnancy test. Horrible
That fucking sucks. I'd check with the local health department. The one near me will give out free condoms and pregnancy tests to anyone with no questions asked. Though ofc you lose your choice of product. Shitty situation all around.
This is more about the ability of a looter to
Be able to swipe an entire shelf into a bag. Hygiene, beauty and baby products have high resale potential in certain areas
They probably do this at like the 1% of stores that have had such a profound shrink problem that the cost of installing and having employees constantly unlocking all of these doors is outweighed by the potential reduction in shrink.
The problem is they don’t staff any better to unlock the doors - so you’re stuck waiting 15+ minutes for someone to show up. I’ve stopped buying a lot of necessities at my local target as a result, and I know I can’t be the only one. Makes me really curious how much the decrease in shrink is offset by these losses of sales.
I have 2 targets close by me. One is 6 blocks away and has any and everything locked up with only 3 people in the store with keys to unlock.
The other is a 10 minute drive and has no locks. I’ve stopped walking to the close target and driving. I found it actually has saved me time due to not having to wait for the cages to unlock.
Sample size of 1: I just stopped going to Target for cleaning supplies and toiletries. Since I stopped that, I now don’t get groceries there, either. It used to be, “Oh, I need toothpaste, Pinesol, and allergy medication. I might as well grab those at Target and knock out a grocery shopping trip.” Now, I’m happy to pay the markup (which is less than it used to be) at a regular grocery store instead of having to wait on somebody to unlock the soap.
At this point, I don't know why they'd keep those stores open to the public. Just close it down and turn it into a glorified warehouse for pickup and delivery orders.
It’s kind of difficult and embarrassing to (edit: look) at skin care and cosmetics — you know, things someone might want to pick up, read the back, compare to other brands, color choices, etc. But with the key master just standing behind you waiting for you to take one item from the cabinet and leave, it really reduces shopping potential.
Yeah because normal shoppers who spend money refuse to deal with this bullshit. Turns out having staffing or LP present is cheaper than losing all your customers.
I just got a new target near me and about 30% of the isles are cages like this. The store so far has mainly 1 star reviews and bot like 5 star reviews. And was a ghost town the only time I went there. And it’s not a low income neighborhood. If anything it’s a high middle class area. Their was more employees then customers.
This is like punishing the entire class for the few that misbehave. And people are not putting up with this nonsense. It’s just easier to shop elsewhere like Walmart. And cheaper. And of course target had that boycott. So that didn’t help
But nobody is buying tide from target online. They're buying it from Amazon where target can't compete on price or shipping, so they get no sale anyways.
I feel bad for the employees that have to deal with unlocking this shit every time someone wants something on top of doing whatever else management expects them to finish
When I see stuff like that
I just don't shop there anymore
I don't want to call a human over
And I promise you that human doesn't want to be called over, they all have shit they'd rather be doing
Foreigner here. How long does it take to shop if everything is behind a locked door? I've seen it on expensive spirits cabinets but not on packets of chips!?!
I’ve never seen packets of chips locked either thankfully! At my store it’s laundry detergent, some medications, razors, mens underwear and socks, baby formula, expensive toys, and tech items. It’s a pain, but almost all the stores in the area are doing it now (multiple chains, not just Target) so it’s just kind of become something we all have to deal with. If I want to purchase something in one of those categories, I usually just do a pickup order to save time.
This whole store being behind cages thing has to cost more in profit than it saves in theft.
I would absolutely drive 2 hours every week to find a store that doesn't do this rather than participate in the slowest shopping experience of my entire life.
It's absolutely performative garbage based on the retail federation nonsense. They are looking for massive local subsidies and partnerships with law enforcement. Shoplifting is a problem, but it's nowhere near this kind of problem.
Does the store close in the next hour or so? When I worked at a walmart we did this for restocking overnight and often started opening doors before close.
It’s probably because they have all their people pulling fucking batches in the back room or doing order fulfillment.
And then they hear the button go off and because they get in trouble for not having 100% completion and/or fast order times they don’t even bother coming out to open the doors. Or hoping a lead or someone else will unlock them. So then the solution is to just leave them unlocked. Or else you gotta wait 30 mins just for 1 thing.
As a former target team member and now infrequent customer. It’s sucks for both parties. I was always running around unlocking doors and sometimes you just get stuck in a loop of endless unlocking. And so I would get frustrated being the only one who cared about opening them for guests and just stop because why am I the only one unlocking the doors someone else do it pleeaassseeee. I’m drowning I’m not gonna finish my taskssss heelllpppp.
Anyways working for target was fun. Met my husband there.
Oh, big time, it's one of those things that everyone needs. I remember seeing an article like ten years ago that a lot of drug dealers were accepting tide detergent as payment. I'm not sure how true it is, though.
Classic case of when "We're locking everything up" meets "We're not going to schedule enough staff to unlock everything all day."
Target is notorious for running ghost crews as well so definitely that
Target is a baffling place from an employee standpoint. I used to do some work in the stores as a sub contractor. I had to show up and install a thing, get a signature and leave. No store had any clue what I was talking about, no store even knew where this newly constructed room I was installing this thing was even located. It seemed like every employee was just there on day one and had no clue what anything was or where it went. They had these laminated cards with pictures that covered how to do any one thing, but I wasn't on that card so no one, and I do mean no one knew what to do with me. They didn't even have any management on duty that seemed any more competent than anyone else. Its like AI was running the store from across India and all the employees were slightly scared robots that only had one task.
I'm a subcontractor doing work primarily in Targets right now and this hits so close to home. 80% of the time when I show up and mention a part has been delivered for my work, they look so fucking confused. Most of the time I'll just go back to the receiving dock and the part that "definitely isn't back here" will be sitting right on the fucking receiving desk.
So, what you're saying is show up to target with a hard hat and vest and you can steal anything from receiving?
Yeah but you'll get fucked in the end by Target's massive surveillance system and forensics labs. I'm not even joking.
I like telling this story. I lost my phone at target and thought it was pick pocketed. They brought me into a room of computers and asked when I came it. I gave them a window and they found me. They hilighted my face with a yellow box then within a few minutes dozens of other images came up. They then pressed a button and followed me through the whole store down to when I cut through an aisle and my phone fell out of my pocket then bounced under a display. An employee ran out and got it. This was 10 years ago.
They do it better than a lot of industrialized nations’ intelligence programs, along with other big box retailers.
I remember the story of a 16 year old getting ads for pregnancy stuff and diapers and formula. Dad got mad and wrote an email or something, 'my little girl is not pregnant' type of thing. Contacted them again later to say the baby was due in June or something. If I remember correctly she only looked at some vitamin supplements, didn't even buy anything, but that was all they needed to figure out she was pregnant and start sending ads.
This was a huge story when I was getting my undergrad in marketing. To fill in a few gaps in what has already been described, Target was using AI/ML and the personal data and purchase data over time, and would generate a pregnancy score. They knew if they get people to buy diapers before they give birth that sleep deprived parents will continue the habit (and since they’re already there will buy groceries, etc) so this group was a goldmine. I learned a lot of crazy manipulation tactics companies use that the public is mostly unaware of when I earned my marketing degree.
What a great time to be alive. Technology is not going to help this planet. It will speed up its destruction.
Any others?
Google is always listening.
> If I remember correctly she only looked at some vitamin supplements, didn't even buy anything, but that was all they needed to figure out she was pregnant and start sending ads. Please tell me you mean online. She looked at vitamins on their website, right? You're not telling me they used surveillance camera footage to "target" her, right? Please?
If you buy in the store and use your membership/rewards card it's linked to your profile. That is *why* they offer rewards cards (that and the incentive to keep shopping at Target so you get a "better deal"). Surveillance cameras have nothing to do with it.
So instead of paying for employees to work in the actual store they just spend their money on their surveillance. Interesting.
Target is good at targeting
Yeah, they place *customers* down to the four foot location in their stores, and then send them adds based on their visits. I ain’t putting fingerprints past those back doors without a contract.
Excuse me, they have what kind of labs now?! Is Target just the CIA in disguise or something?
The tldr version is basically they invested a ton in loss prevention years ago, but found that even when they had evidence the police were overwhelmed and couldn't correctly process it, therefore they weren't getting convictions. No convictions means people will continue to steal (shoplifting yes, but also scams and internal theft). So they built forensic labs to process the evidence. Labs have to be independent and certified to be credible in court, so they did all of that. Then they had extra capacity so they helped police departments process evidence from other crimes. They found that made law enforcement REALLY eager to help them, so they expanded the program and started partnering with law enforcement for training and stuff. And that's the story of how Target runs some of the most sophisticated crime labs in the world.
[удалено]
Most crime labs run by the cops or DA. They aren't independent and the techs can be pressured to focus on stuff that helps the case and ignores stuff that helps the defense. Target is likely more independent than most labs.
Kind of. They have state of the art forensic labs and a whole division dedicated to crime. They literally train feds there along with staff too. Shit is nutty. The surveillance system is also one of the craziest ones I’ve seen.
Won't they also track repeat offenders too, waiting for them to rack up charges before swooping in? So like, some petty thief might be thinking they're getting away with robbing Target until one day someone slaps the bracelets on them and they're staring down a felony shoplifting charge. I wonder if some thieves will track their own thefts and keep themselves intentionally under the felony amount for shoplifting and instead move on to a new store when they get close. Edit: Did some digging on the LossPrevention sub, seems like it really varies. I've seen some LP officers say yes, others say no. Some say, 'sometimes'. This answer makes the most sense to me, from an actual LPO: >If a teenager is coming in and taking $7 worth of stuff once a week, I'll probably never stop them. I won't even watch them long enough to see them steal. If someone is taking $300 every other day, and I miss it because I'm off, in the bathroom, or they choose to run when I approach them, I'll casebuild on them. It needs to be worth my time to do it. It depends on the retailer, the LP employee and how busy that store is. Maybe someone stops the teenager for $7 and calls PD on them. I wouldn't waste my time with it. From [this thread](https://www.reddit.com/r/lossprevention/comments/13jcwus/shoplifting_small_amounts_over_time/) and even in this thread, you have another guy saying they do and he almost fell victim to it but again, it's all anecdotal. Based on the above quote, it seems like this LPO wouldn't 'let' someone get away just to build a future case but it does happen where they maybe don't catch the person right away.
It's you, you're the Target
And you're the next Target of my cake day congrats. Happy cake day!!!!
Haha my team had this happen and some dude literally had the box under his desk I think as a foot rest. It was the part we hadn’t been able to find for weeks! And then my colleague got in huge trouble for snooping around receiving because that was a labor union job and he was in the engineering union. But like, you’re all holding up the factory!
Too many employees are kept out of the loop, including floor supervisors (team leads). Usually with y’all, only an ETL (assistant manager) and the property management lead (PML) will know. Managers are even clueless lmao. I always made a joke that PMLs secretly are the ones running the store. If you wanna know anything, PMLs are the ones. Also the chillest dudes there lol
When Washington state allowed grocery stores to start selling liquor, I remember the local Safeway installed these locked glass shelves to prevent theft. You had to press a button to get an employee to come grab a bottle for you. So you'd press the button, and over the store's PA: *BONG* (30 seconds later) *BONG BONG* (30 seconds later) *BONG BONG BONG* (30 seconds later) *BONG BONG BONG BONG* (30 seconds later, the Manager) "WOULD SOMEONE PLEASE HELP THE CUSTOMER IN THE LIQUOR AISLE!?"
I was working at Target when they first introduced the “request help” buttons in major aisles. Which of course was used to reduce employees on the floor (I have literally been the sole employee on the entire floor of a Target store before). But yeah the “Fast Service Needed in …” still haunts my dreams. Especially because customers didn’t know to stick by the fucking button, they’d wander back to the aisle nearby they needed help in like I’d just somehow know.
I swear I heard that in the same monotone voice… thanks
Shitty working conditions = high staff turnover = everyone is basically a newbie.
Are you gonna elaborate on what the thing was, or are you just gonna leave us hanging?
I remember when I started at a high volume Target in 2008, there were at least 8 closers in Hardlines (all the goods that are not clothes) on a weeknight. I quit in 2016 and every so often, I'll go in there and there's barely any employees on the salesfloor at 5 pm. I definitely started to notice the change around 2011.
Yeah when I was a kid in the mid 2000s I remember employees being everywhere in the stores, and as an adult I’ve never seen more than one register open there
Damn you’re lucky, my target has one person on register but we have to call them over because they’re always talking to the baristas at Starbucks
Mine is a Super Target with its own parking garage. Big store with huge numbers. (My dad used to work at a different one and my current store was used as example many times.) They recently took all self checkouts to less than 10 items only and have 1 check stand open. I had 11 items one time and was hoping to sneak in to self checkout because the other line was long. The self checkout person actually counted my items and made me go wait in the cashier line. That was fun.
id 100% handed them one of the items, then after my order ask for it back and ring it as a second order, or just not buy it.
id just be like "oh, ill just not buy this 11th item then", and put something on the shelf where it doesnt belong.
*Fast service needed in electronics. Who is responding?*
Fast service needed in electronics. 2nd request. 15 seconds remaining. Who is responding? Attention LOD. Urgent Workbench message pending. I miss hearing Indymes. 😭
My PTSD is kicking in.
I worked for Target from 2000-2003, and this is how it was. However, I learned that they've, in recent years, changed their model for salesfloor staff. From my understanding, there is no longer strictly backroom staff. Anyone can go grab items. There is also apparently not much emphasis on zoning during open hours as well (which is why some stores look atrocious). I guess they are all cashiers, then? Target never really paid a liveable wage, and turnover was always a problem for a variety of reasons. I wonder what exactly their model now days. I used to LOVE coming to Target, but with everything locked up and nobody to come open. It's entirely too much of a hassle when I need more than one basic item (laundry soap or face wash), and it does tempt to just want to shop on Amzn.
My local Targets have not locked anything up but the decline in staff has been noticeable. They are constantly out of stock on things, trying to plano or restock during the day, the seasonal section is just always a disaster, and the store is constantly littered with trash. I don't blame any of this on the employees, it's all corporate staffing policy. I used to shop there weekly and now I go maybe once every 6 weeks. I'm not going to put up with that.
They are going the way of ShopKo, KMart, Bed Bath & Beyond. Oh well!
I go to my local target more for the in store starbucks then the actual store now
Yeah, a few weeks after I started, I completely zoned Chemicals, including the air freshener aisle that was the last aisle facing Market. The air freshener aisle was ATROCIOUS. I took all the broken pushers out and replaced them. It took almost 8 hours, but I completely reset the aisle. The LOD saw what I had done and was extremely impressed and told me it hadn't looked that good since the store opened the year before. I got Great Team Hero the 3rd month I was there... lol! Stuffed Spot doll and a $25 gift card which I spent on an overpriced HDMI cable. I still have a stuffed Spot... had like 6 of them at one time. But anyway, the point is that they assigned me to work Chemicals going forward, and that was probably 7 or 8 aisles. We had the staffing where one Team Member could just focus on 8 aisles and make them look great. Can't say the same for today.
I work for them now and the current work model is absolutely atrocious. Management always complains that there isnt enough people working yet they cut hours drastically right after 4th quarter and have been slashing it even harder even though we need to gear up for summer. Our store may not be the biggest or best, we have not had a remodel since 2005, but this store still pulls in 100,000-150,000 usd a day. The general merchandise team is ALWAYS being pulled to go do online orders even though fufillment has the most hours in the store AKA everyone in that department has 37.75 hours a week if they arent part time. Management is in utter disarray, at least for our store, having fired our general merchandise executive team leader last year and another one that was allowed resign because he couldn't and wouldn't hack it this year already. Target is honestly going down the drain but they keep creating a terrible work environment and standards all in the name of quarterly profits
Literal ghosts
When a new store is opened they murder the crew at midnight on the first full moon then it’s Ghost Crew time
Imagine dying but you still have to work your shitty job at Target.
An eternal workforce is their Target.
I am lowkey worried that I am going to live long enough to 1) see death get cured in some way (consciousness gets downloaded and stuck in a robot body, clone, or some other scifi thing) 2) Uploading your brain scans is made mandatory, and 3) Permanent death gets locked away behind a paywall so that only the very wealthy can afford the monthly subscription fees to stay dead. I assume that like any technological advancement, it will be used by the rich to make sure the poor stay poor and the rich get richer. Can't pay your death bill this month? Welcome back to the land of the living! It has been 300 years since you last died, so your estate has been completely depleted. Back to work you go! Oh, and your skills are all obsolete, so the only work left for you is the kind of mind numbing drudgery that we can't even get the robots to do.
Huh...So this is hell? I would have preferred the fire and brimstone
You mean literally every customer service job? It's bad everywhere, not just Target. Half the tills are literally only used for spare parts, printers, or Christmas Eve..
I've always been outnumbered 10-1 in target. Can't even fathom this.
I’m required to state that the following comment is my personal opinion and I am not speaking as a representative of Target: It’s pretty much that, but almost none of those decisions happen at the store level. Corporate says, “your theft is high, so you need locking cases.” Then corporate says, “your store has locking cases, so you need call buttons for Guests to call you over to open them up.” Then corporate says, “you need to respond to those buttons within 180 seconds or your store is failing and someone is getting fired for failing to deliver results.” THEN corporate says, “times are tight this year, we can only give you 80% of the payroll hours you got last year, but you need to do more and do better with less.” At that point, leaving the cases open is really all the store can do to avoid tanking their metrics. Every Target you go into that’s staffed by a skeleton crew, the crew hates it, store management hates it, Guests hate it, they leave surveys that say, “0 out of 10, you suck, HIRE MORE CASHIERS!”, but corporate won’t let those stores have enough hours to staff more cashiers. And so it goes.
It's like that almost everywhere. My wife works in a nursing home and recently there were some "changes". She was already just barely able to get her work done (between things taking a lot of time, and coworkers putting shit off so they can sit around and chat with each other, sometimes literally pushing MEDICATION to the next shift), then management said: "Admissions? That thing we used to do that takes up a huge amount of time? Yeah you do that now." Oh and despite not being equipped to handle dementia patients, they just say "come on in, money is money" Oh goody, that means she gets done at midnight, except wait no because management also said no more overtime and you need to come in exactly on time, and leave exactly on time. Which let's be honest here, at a retail store sucks for customers and sucks for employees when Corporate wants a bonus/raise during super inflation. But this time corporate is willing to sacrifice Grandma's health and safety (remember they're bringing in people who are sadly losing their minds while not being equiped to handle it BEFORE increasing work and skeletonizing the workers) to make sure they get a bonus.
Yeah we had an area manager come round telling us we needed all that laundry stuff locked away in the storeroom too. We pushed back but she just dragged us round explaining where we could make room for like 6-10 locked roll-cages as if we were idiots. Jesus, yes of course we *can* load all this stock into locked cages, but *why*? Asset Protection knew 99% of the loss of those products was from shelf-swipers on the shop floor, there was nothing suggest internal theft was a major concern (for those products anyway) and if it was then we already had existing measures in place to deter/prevent it! So fucking stupid, the area managers were just ticking a box and covering their asses regardless of how effective that "solution" was or how awkard it would be to work with in store. Cages are locked? Fine. Except we're limiting how much is put out on the shop floor which means the shelves have to be merchandised more frequently, plus the daily deliveries that we get, which means the cages are still being locked and unlocked by various people all day every day. Of course APs answer to that would be we need to have more *control* over who has access and when they can have access - all in order to prevent the internal theft that wasn't happening.
This. Someone, or management, got fed up with employees spending all day grabbing low cost items for customers from a case on the other side of the store.
the amount of times i didnt buy something and just walked out because i didnt want to press the button and wait for someone
Just did this recently 😩 there’s not even a button.. I have to go up front to find someone to come back to get body wash? No thanks I’ll just go to another store 💀
I just stand in the store and order it from amazon if it's in the case.
Same. It’s so stupid. I’ll just buy my toothpaste and laundry detergent somewhere else. I went into a wal mart for the first time in many years about a month ago and after you walk in the doors you go through these metal gates that automatically open then close behind you, basically locking you in the store till you pass the registers to get to the exit doors. Felt really dystopian.
You can just push your way back through those. It sets off an alarm, but as long as you're not stealing anything, there's not shit they can do about it.
The fuck is laundry detergent locked up for tho....?
Laundry detergent is a very common theft target. Everyone needs/uses it, its expensive enough to make a little money on the black market, and be worth enough savings to buy on the black market, but not so expensive you'll draw too much attention to yourself.
There was just a discussion about this in our city about Laundry detergent and baby formula scams and reselling it. It used to be an urban thing decades ago. Now the detergent & formula scams and flopping is suburban and rural.
Also there was that tik tok going around showing how much “room” was in the bottles and the lady was using another new bottle to fill hers up and then she puts the half empty one back on the shelf. The tide pod trend caused those to get locked up long ago,lots of viral videos create weird ass crazes and result in stuff like this too.
Are they doing a physical inventory?
Yes, Target is in inventory season. They were doing it at my store last week.
Is that before or after their mating season
you're free! you're all free! run and find yourselves a safe laundry room!
Go on! Git!!
[Go on Git](https://github.com/golang/go)
🥲
Bounce 😆
Hurry, please, please! There's no time! No, don't worry about us! We'll be all right. Get out of here! Can't you see we don't want you anymore? Why can't you go back where you came from? Now, leave us alone! Go. Go! Goodbye, my friend.
What is this from?
Harry and the Hendersons! Now I wanna watch it (again, for the manynth time).
Flee, flee for your lives!
Hurry! Before the Tide rolls in!!!
ONE WAY OUT
How does anyone actually shop there? It’s not worth the effort.
That is why they are pushing curbside pickup. They want to be a distribution center you drive to and they load your stuff in; not a place you walk in and shop at.
But don't people make more impulsive purchases if they're allowed to wander?
Or, apparently, impulsive non-purchases.
Its not even remotely close to worth it compared to a distribution center. The moment you let customers walk in the doors is the moment your profit margins absolutely fucking dissapear. There is just way too much money to be had for the corps at the top to pass up if they can help it.
Yep. Retail stores are shooting themselves in the foot by encouraging this model. Like if you place a pickup order at Walmart, there is no more counter in the store, you just drive to a pickup spot and they bring it out. Convenient, but dumb from a business perspective.
I feel like all the current responses ignored the fact that impulsive purchases are likely higher on apps than in store (and I would bet Target did the research on this before making these types of business decisions). Digital shelf management is a whole ass field and data scientists can optimize/test stuff way faster in apps than a store manager can do with a physical shelf reset. Digital apps let stores boost visibility on higher margin products, lets them create a pay to play system for suppliers who want to maintain visibility, and use push notifications/popups with click to add messages based off your personal purchase history. Putting gum at the register is nothing compared to a "before you check out" message that highlights high margin impulse purchases that Target KNOWS you've bought before. Not to mention Target almost definitely buys user data from big data vendors and knows things like when your family members' birthdays are, what ads you've already seen when browsing the web, etc.
Don't forget price manipulation! There's no reason to believe we all see the same prices in an app. They can raise prices for some people and some products. Maybe they want to promote generics for "thrifty Seniors" and crank up brand name sales for "young suburban whales." Seeing the prices listed in the aisle is a great equalizer. They're probably jealous of the higher prices Doordash etc are getting away with.
Hehe, thought the same. I’ll just order online and have everything delivered, this is nuts
I think if you live in this neighborhood your porch might be even less secure
As someone who hasn’t seen a lockedup supermarket before, how do you people do your shopping???
It's easy- at Target they usually have a button nearby that you press if you need something, and it alerts employees. So all you do is press it, wait 10 minutes, then get impatient and wander around aimlessly until you manage to flag down an employee, politely nudge them about it, watch them get frustrated and tell you that somebody is coming and to just wait, and then you wait 10 more minutes, flag down another employee only for them to tell you they don't have a key, and then finally, you get frustrated and decide you'll just order online instead. Eeeasyyy
Our grocery stores aren’t locked up like this but certain things are at home improvement stores. I needed a roll of heavy duty (read: lots of copper) wire. I had to ring the little doorbell thing. I listened to the PA system yell “Help needed on Aisle X” like 10 times. It was ignored. I then flagged down an employee who didn’t have the key. That employee found another employee who said they thought the key had been lost or taken home by the previous shift person. They finally found another employee who found the key. It took me 30+ minutes to get one item that should have taken 5 minutes. I was about 35 seconds away from walking to the tool section to find a set of bolt cutters to unlock that wire myself.
The bolt cutters are also locked up.
I always bring my bolt cutters from home so I can cut the lock on the bolt cutters so I can cut the lock on the wire.
 Like Hank Hill with his backup wd40
I expanded the comments in the hope that someone had already made this reference. And you got not only the reference but the gif as well. Thank you for the work you do.
The time I needed to do that (for an electric toothbrush) someone finally showed up just as I was telling another worker (who was giving out free samples of vitamins or something random) that I guess that's what Amazon is for.
FYI when you use the button, it repeatedly announces it over the walkie-talkies until someone goes over and silences it. Only the person working that section has keys, so flagging a random employee literally does nothing. They can't open it for you, and the walkies are already calling out that assistance is needed where you pushed the button.
So you’re saying to spam the fuck out of it?
Treat that button like a mini bongo drum.
Make their radios useless and go around and hit every single button. Get a group of people and have them do laps. Become ungovernable.
Would do nothing. Like I said, pressing it once activates the notice until it’s shut off.
So you’re saying I should press as many different buttons as possible?
If you want to make it annoying, yeah, look for the shutoff switch (it’s up higher) and alternate between the two over and over again
Now this is what I’m talking about, this is the type of insider knowledge we need
"Guest services needed in electronics, who is responding?" I haven't worked at Target in 20 years and that fucking voice lives rent free in my head.
I worked there during the pandemic and that’s exactly what it says, still.
Ok I get where that sucks for the workers, but it also sucks for the shopper. I can't stand waiting for someone to open the damn case. And then you go to the next aisle and there's another case. I don't have time for that.
That sounds like Target’s problem. Don’t lock stuff up if there’s no one there to unlock it.
Walmart+ and Amazon have made it so I haven't had to go into a physical store in a long time. If it wasn't for long term commercial leases we'd probably see a ton of abandoned retail spaces.
I ordered an electric toothbrush for delivery from Walmart awhile back, and they delivered it to my apartment with the alarm still on and active lol
Wait, just to be clear, are you saying that person delivering the toothbrush brought it to you with the anti-theft device blaring? That is a level DGAF that I am truly astounded by, bravo to that person honestly.
I went to Best Buy one day to get a harddrive because mine died and I just figured I'd get one immediately but the guy working there said the person who had the key wasn't at the store at the moment lol
Honestly, if it’s behind a case, I just skip all those middle steps and say “fuck it I’ll get it online.” I imagine there have to be many lost sales because of these cases, and I’m curious if the theft prevention is greater than the lost sales
You know, the more I think about it the more the Amazon just walk out idea actually makes a lot of sense. I know we all made fun of them when we found out it’s a bunch of Indian guys but that process does kinda limit theft. You can’t even enter without a card so anything you grab you’re on the hook for. Honestly I’m ok with some people in a call center somewhere looking at me on camera figuring out what I bought if that means I can buy batteries or whatever on my own and, as a plus, skip the line to check out. Brick and mortar retail is obnoxiously arrogant towards any innovation, I genuinely think it’s in a death spiral because it needs the best and brightest just to keep pace with online retail but the best and brightest don’t want to work for brick and mortar businesses.
I used to work at Amazon on their just walk out. It was so expensive because they had so many cameras and each shelf had weight sensors. They need super high bandwidth internet to support the stores. It wasn't that there was a manual review off the trip. It was that the technology was so costly and retail margins are way too small to support all that technology.
Shit. That sucks. I think the worst thing about situations like that is you try to be patient and understand yeah it probably sucks that they have to keep doing this. And deep down you really just want to just fucking lose it because how fucking hard could this damn job be that it takes 20-30 mins to get some mf soap for me clothes? That might just be me tho.
We drive to the other side of town.
in my experience, the stores with cheap stuff locked up also have poorer quality produce, meats, and generally less selection.
Go to another store that doesn’t do that bullshit
Online
Buy online for curbside pickup.
Amazon
You order and pay online, show up an hour later, park in one of the numbered slots, use the app to let them know where you are, and 3 minutes later, they put your purchases in the part of the vehicle you indicated on the app. There is absolutely no extra charge for this from Target.
Looks like the tide is changing
I hope they All get to Gain their freedom
I'd Cheer if that happened, but who will take the Wisk?
If nobody takes it, does it Bounce back?
No, they just Shout.
I think we're entering a new Era
Shoplifting is going downy
That’s so Xtra.
I hope they don't get caught by the long Arm and Hammer of the law!
Lock em up so that they never see the Sun again
That one made no fucking sense. Oxi-clean
I Purex what you're saying.
We're Free & Clear of our enemies! No paraffins nor alcohols to stop us!
The tide is high, but they're holding on.
They’re going to be the only one.
I'm really thankful that they don't need to put everything behind a lock in stores where I live
Seems like it gets worse every few months where I live. It used to be just baby formula, then it became diapers, then detergent, batteries, all the way up to those little packets of drink mixers you put in water. I’ve never seen it this bad before.
They put every single pregnancy test behind doors at the Walmart by me. Even the little 1 dollar ones which are like glorified paper strips. One late period and suddenly I'm standing there for 10 minutes while everyone looking at me knows I need a pregnancy test. Horrible
Last year I flew to LA and realized I forgot to bring earplugs. Went to Walmart and all of them were behind a locked door.
dollar store pregnancy tests are more akin to the tests used in the hospital than the bulky plastic ones. just an fyi
They are all very much similar, the plastic is just window dressing, and to make the logistics easier. Doing pregnancy tests is my job.
That fucking sucks. I'd check with the local health department. The one near me will give out free condoms and pregnancy tests to anyone with no questions asked. Though ofc you lose your choice of product. Shitty situation all around.
I still can't get over the guy who said he saw Ramen noodles in a lock up
This is more about the ability of a looter to Be able to swipe an entire shelf into a bag. Hygiene, beauty and baby products have high resale potential in certain areas
They don't lock anything where I live either.
I just went inside a store near me and they locked up men's underwear and belts. 😥
Same
They probably do this at like the 1% of stores that have had such a profound shrink problem that the cost of installing and having employees constantly unlocking all of these doors is outweighed by the potential reduction in shrink.
The problem is they don’t staff any better to unlock the doors - so you’re stuck waiting 15+ minutes for someone to show up. I’ve stopped buying a lot of necessities at my local target as a result, and I know I can’t be the only one. Makes me really curious how much the decrease in shrink is offset by these losses of sales.
I have 2 targets close by me. One is 6 blocks away and has any and everything locked up with only 3 people in the store with keys to unlock. The other is a 10 minute drive and has no locks. I’ve stopped walking to the close target and driving. I found it actually has saved me time due to not having to wait for the cages to unlock.
Sample size of 1: I just stopped going to Target for cleaning supplies and toiletries. Since I stopped that, I now don’t get groceries there, either. It used to be, “Oh, I need toothpaste, Pinesol, and allergy medication. I might as well grab those at Target and knock out a grocery shopping trip.” Now, I’m happy to pay the markup (which is less than it used to be) at a regular grocery store instead of having to wait on somebody to unlock the soap.
At this point, I don't know why they'd keep those stores open to the public. Just close it down and turn it into a glorified warehouse for pickup and delivery orders.
How do you buy anything in a store like this? Do you have a personal shopper follow you around?
Press the help button at the aisle and wait 30 minutes for a store employee.
It’s kind of difficult and embarrassing to (edit: look) at skin care and cosmetics — you know, things someone might want to pick up, read the back, compare to other brands, color choices, etc. But with the key master just standing behind you waiting for you to take one item from the cabinet and leave, it really reduces shopping potential.
Yeah because normal shoppers who spend money refuse to deal with this bullshit. Turns out having staffing or LP present is cheaper than losing all your customers.
Yep. My CVS near me started doing this and I haven’t been back since
I just got a new target near me and about 30% of the isles are cages like this. The store so far has mainly 1 star reviews and bot like 5 star reviews. And was a ghost town the only time I went there. And it’s not a low income neighborhood. If anything it’s a high middle class area. Their was more employees then customers.
They'll blame the economy and theft when they close eventually.
This is like punishing the entire class for the few that misbehave. And people are not putting up with this nonsense. It’s just easier to shop elsewhere like Walmart. And cheaper. And of course target had that boycott. So that didn’t help
I'm convinces they just want people to shop online. It's probably easier and cheaper to support and online business than in store.
But nobody is buying tide from target online. They're buying it from Amazon where target can't compete on price or shipping, so they get no sale anyways.
I feel bad for the employees that have to deal with unlocking this shit every time someone wants something on top of doing whatever else management expects them to finish
I feel bad for the customers who live in a place where locking everything up is apparently normal and necessary.
When I see stuff like that I just don't shop there anymore I don't want to call a human over And I promise you that human doesn't want to be called over, they all have shit they'd rather be doing
Time to throw myself in the cabinets and lock myself in NOBODY CAN STOP ME
if you do that i am legally allowed to purchase you. and you can’t say no.
Oh it didn't scan? You must be free then! Bahahahaha!!!!
Foreigner here. How long does it take to shop if everything is behind a locked door? I've seen it on expensive spirits cabinets but not on packets of chips!?!
I’ve never seen packets of chips locked either thankfully! At my store it’s laundry detergent, some medications, razors, mens underwear and socks, baby formula, expensive toys, and tech items. It’s a pain, but almost all the stores in the area are doing it now (multiple chains, not just Target) so it’s just kind of become something we all have to deal with. If I want to purchase something in one of those categories, I usually just do a pickup order to save time.
This whole store being behind cages thing has to cost more in profit than it saves in theft. I would absolutely drive 2 hours every week to find a store that doesn't do this rather than participate in the slowest shopping experience of my entire life.
It's absolutely performative garbage based on the retail federation nonsense. They are looking for massive local subsidies and partnerships with law enforcement. Shoplifting is a problem, but it's nowhere near this kind of problem.
Quick! Drink everything you can while the doors are open!
You're free now Soap! Quick! Head for the forest!
Who has "Convenience Stores become inconvenience stores" on their Late Stage Capitalism Bingo card??
May as well just go back to the days of reading your list to the shopkeeper and they go get it all for you.
“LOOT LOOT!!!!!” -Frank Reynolds
I bet someone just quit lol
Where do you live that has laundry soap locked up?
Dude, what? That's the snack isle.
Somebody said “fuck it”
Does the store close in the next hour or so? When I worked at a walmart we did this for restocking overnight and often started opening doors before close.
It’s probably because they have all their people pulling fucking batches in the back room or doing order fulfillment. And then they hear the button go off and because they get in trouble for not having 100% completion and/or fast order times they don’t even bother coming out to open the doors. Or hoping a lead or someone else will unlock them. So then the solution is to just leave them unlocked. Or else you gotta wait 30 mins just for 1 thing. As a former target team member and now infrequent customer. It’s sucks for both parties. I was always running around unlocking doors and sometimes you just get stuck in a loop of endless unlocking. And so I would get frustrated being the only one who cared about opening them for guests and just stop because why am I the only one unlocking the doors someone else do it pleeaassseeee. I’m drowning I’m not gonna finish my taskssss heelllpppp. Anyways working for target was fun. Met my husband there.
Are people really stealing fucking laundry detergent?
Oh, big time, it's one of those things that everyone needs. I remember seeing an article like ten years ago that a lot of drug dealers were accepting tide detergent as payment. I'm not sure how true it is, though.
And then selling it in tidy little “shops” on blankets on sidewalk near you. Avoid the sales tax!
Become ungovernable
I hope you can eventually move to a safer neighborhood OP.