Case Study—Target: From “Expect More” to “Pay Less”

In 1881, George Dayton the Founder of “Dayton Dry Goods” (now known as “TARGET Corp.”) had laid down the main principle of his belief in “the higher ground of stewardship”. Even today, that principle is still visible in their slogan “Expect More” “Pay Less”. As one of the largest, discount retail stores in the world only compared to the “Corporate Giant” Wal-Mart, they have always been the better quality store of the two. Target has always leaned towards one side of their slogan “Expect More.” This has always been good for Target as it uses a diversification strategy to stay unique and offer higher fashion clothing and appliances. But as soon as the economy leaned towards a recession, Target was faced to even their strategy plan to get the company back up from the recession, by letting people know that you can still “Expect More”, but “Pay Way Less”.

1. What microenvironmental factors have affected Target’s performance over the past few years?

Microenvironmental factors that affected them would include Company, competitors, media, and intermediaries. Target itself, is a discount retail store, but is known to carry designer wears. Since Target is known for style, fashionable and slightly higher priced clothing and appliances, and in the end, they hurt themselves. Target should have done a lot better of a job in providing customer value and satisfaction then Wal-Mart or others. Customers would have stayed loyal if valued and satisfied. Wal-Mart had a huge microenvironment affect as a competitor is the low cost store, which lures customers in and would normally get most of the attention, through the consumers assuming that they have a cheaper and better buys. As Wal-Mart did 5 percent better in quarterly posting of profits and Target’s sales and profits were shooting down, the Media spreading this through