SCOTT DETROW, HOST:
Shopper boycotts rarely hurt a company's bottom line, but that has not been the case this year for Target. This week, the retail giant once again reported sales were down, and earlier this year, executives admitted boycotts were part of a reason for that. NPR's Alina Selyukh is here to put this all in context. Alina, what makes these boycotts different?
ALINA SELYUKH, BYLINE: So what's unusual about Target is that it has faced not one, but multiple boycotts over several years. Start in 2023, it had a crisis around its Pride Month collection. Conservative activists claimed its Pride clothes went too far, especially for kids. People were knocking down Pride displays. They were threatening store employees. And then Target decided to move those Pride displays or even remove them, and the flip-flop really upset the LGBTQ community and allies.
So then fast forward to this year, and Target in January shifted its position on diversity, equity and inclusion. The company was one of many to add DEI policies after the police killing of George Floyd in 2020 in Target's hometown in Minneapolis. But as President Trump took office and he was campaigning against DEI, Target was one of the companies to scale back on diversity goals, and this led to a really big boycott, especially by Black shoppers.
DETROW: So what do we know about the financial effect of all of this?
SELYUKH: Sure. In May, Target executives included the DEI boycott in the list of reasons why the sales were down, and this was remarkable because a concession like that does not happen often. Soon after, CEO Brian Cornell wrote an op-ed saying Target's commitment to diversity and inclusion is, quote, "unwavering." Target has kept up its plan to invest in Black-owned businesses.
Now, there are some people claiming this week that boycotts also prompted Cornell to announce he's stepping down as CEO, and that is not the case, exactly. Target did signal his retirement plan years ago. But it all fuels this bad trend at Target, where sales have now been down or flat for almost three years.
DETROW: And you can't pin that all on boycotts, right? What are the other problems?
SELYUKH: No, a lot has gone wrong at Target. Inflation has been a particularly painful problem. The company also made missteps ever since the pandemic. Like, it overstocked on stuff people did not want. I talked to Jamie Meyers. He's a senior analyst at the investment firm Laffer Tengler. And he argues Target is having an identity crisis.
JAMIE MEYERS: Target doesn't have the scale to be a Walmart or an Amazon with those sort of everyday, low prices. It's not a dollar store. It's not Dollar General. It's not Dollar Tree.
SELYUKH: It's not cheap, but it's also not a luxury. And often in retail, being the rival stuck in the middle can be the worst place.
DETROW: Getting back to the boycott problem, specifically...
SELYUKH: OK.
DETROW: ...Though, what can other companies learn from this?
SELYUKH: I think part of it is knowing your audience. In Target's case, a lot of its shoppers fell on one side of the DEI debate, feeling like Target abandoned its Black shoppers and employees, and those were key shoppers.
But also it's the waffling response that often gets companies. Like, what do you stand for? Do you stand for anything? We saw this with Budweiser two years ago. It faced a big boycott from the conservative corner after hiring a transgender TikTokker for a PR campaign, but then it flipped its position and distanced itself from her, upsetting the LGBTQ community in the process. Historically, branding experts will say boycotts are a flash in the long run, and unfortunately for Target, its sales are sour for many more reasons than boycotts.
DETROW: NPR's Alina Selyukh, thanks so much.
Thank you. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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