Woolco did not go bankrupt. Woolworth liquidated the division. For Woolco to be bankrupt, Woolworth would have to have done so as well, which never happened. They *did* close all stores, but closing all stores and filing for bankruptcy are two distinctly different things.pseudo3d wrote:Cheap chic is not Target's DNA and arguably I think this has hurt the chain. Target's strength, traditionally, was being a more upscale discounter at a time when everyone else (Kmart, Wal-Mart, Ames, Zayre) was pretty dowdy. The only ones to really come close to Target at the time were Woolco and Venture, both of which eventually went bankrupt. Target had to switch, though, when Wal-Mart and Kmart (the only ones really left by the late 1990s) started to improve their stores.
Venture was a direct copy of Target, down to policies and store layouts, because its founder, John Geisse, was directly involved with the founding of Target. Venture never built up enough in one place to sustain itself, and indeed did go bankrupt.
Target always ran nicer, cleaner stores than Kmart and Walmart. Indeed, Walmart stepped things up a bit when Target began to be a threat, but Kmart only stepped things up because of Walmart. Target is now stepping things up because they cannot continue to grow unless something changes.
Indeed, Target only sells you what they think you should have, and it's all decidedly upscale from Walmart. Walmart is not as useless as Target, because for approximately every 4 Walmart stores, there are 1-1/2 Target stores. In Rural areas, that number drops dramatically. Up until the year 2000, Louisiana had 2 Target stores. TWO. There were at that time 80 Walmart stores. Market penetration makes things go more smoothly, and makes a company less useless.pseudo3d wrote:Target has become pretty useless for a lot of things, a lot of merchandise I've wanted to buy and was there looked like it had already been opened and returned, and it's also taken the trend of having less people on the floor, making it just as useless as Walmart. Groceries are pretty useless at the way they still keep relatively small footprints, have destroyed depth, and the grocery departments that are there just aren't very good. They lack the full service departments that real grocery stores have, and don't even have fresh produce. If they really cared about grocery, they would at least make larger stores--they have the money to do so and have replaced smaller locations before. But they really don't. Grocery at least seems to be better stocked than Walmart, generally, but probably because their volume is so much less.
To me, Target always attacked the grocery market half-heartedly, only doing so to show they wanted to compete with Walmart and then Kmart's Supercenters. The Deli and Bakery were items that were brought in and reheated or prepared. Dry grocery was about half of what Walmart carried. It just wasn't worth it.
Any improvement they could make would be better, but I suspect they'll go the opposite way.