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Comment by umvi | Hacker News Reader

Does your average consumer actually care?

I've never met a single person that had a mindset of "I need to pick up some stuff at Target... oh wait I just remembered they cancelled their internal DEI program, I'd better do some research and shop at a retailer that still has a DEI program instead"

I guess I'm just not sure how the causality was determined. How do I know foot traffic isn't decreasing because of Target's prices compared to Costco's prices?

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Target had been pandering to the LGBTQ community for a long time, they released many shirts and ads that tried to present itself as inclusive and forward thinking.

But the very second things change on the top, they flip.

Yes quite a few people are upset at this. They concretely damaged their brand, ruined trust, and pissed off a bunch of their target market. There is an intentional boycott now and it is clearly affecting their stock

My opinion on this is that as a generic business it's better to just stay out of politics and not pander to specific groups. You may score some short-term wins but if you fail any purity test from that point onwards, or pull back at all, that group will feel jilted and retaliate. Then, you're worse off than if you had just remained neutral.

This post counts as another one of the 1.56 billion.

It wasn't because Costco embraced DEI as much as Target actively dropping it as quickly as possible after Inauguration Day. They didn't even wait for a challenge. To me that means they were happy to drop it as quickly as they could. Which means it was all for show in the first place.

I've also seen a few half-assed attempts to go viral and bring customers back, which only makes me want to spend more elsewhere.

Yes my family has stopped shopping at Target unless everyone else is out of stock of something we know they carry. I’ve been there once since they did this while previously we would go once a week or so.

I think the point of the person you are replying to is that you are in a very, very small minority. So small that a decline in foot traffic at Target is likely only correlated with a decline in foot traffic, and nowhere near a cause of it.

It's not that small a minority within the market segment target has been successfully focusing on for two decades.

Agreed. When Target pushed Starbucks-in-Target, it was pretty obvious how they were positioning.

And granted, their furniture design is pretty nice, compared to what their competitor big-boxes stock.

Enough drops of water eventually make a puddle. Target was already second fiddle to Walmart so alienating a consumer base they spent years deliberately tailoring marketing for is not a good idea if the boat is already leaky.

I have stopped shopping there as well, but continue to shop at Amazon. Amazon is clear that they are a corporation who only cares about the bottom line. I can respect that vs Target who is pandering.

On a similar note, my family eschews Hobby Lobby for similar ideological reasons.

Ah. This post counts for one, or 0.000173% of the 1.56 billion customers (annual).

- Demographics https://www.numerator.com/snapshots/target/

- More demographics https://www.contimod.com/target-statistics/

What might be interesting is to sample your persons more broadly (across country) and in more quantity?

> Does your average consumer actually care?

Yes. This is an anecdote but I personally know people who are boycotting Target and a lot of other companies that backtracked on DEI and LGBTQ rights. I think these companies are all posturing and will say what they think will get you in the door but other people I know are taking this personally and changing their spending habits to reflect that.

If the average target consumer didn't care, Target wouldn't have had 10 weeks of consecutive foot traffic declines. Most things sold in Target can be bought elsewhere, so people have voted with their wallets.

Executives at Target made the calculation that their sales wouldn't decline much (if at all) by publicly canceling their DEI programs.

To the question about Target and Costco's prices: Typically these retailers will have price matching policies in place to keep foot traffic.

Quick google search implies (not sure how accurate this is), that approximately 12% of Target's demographic is black [0]. Seeing close to a 10% drop in foot traffic for a low margin business like Target when a competitor is seeing almost the near opposite gains is a signal someone really screwed up.

[0] https://expertbeacon.com/targets-target-market/

Especially because it wasn’t like target came out to say “we hate DEI now”, they just realized that any corporation that had a DEI program was going to open themselves up to legal issues so they just can’t say things out loud anymore.

Yes and practically it's a slippery slope .. marginalizing the weak, via government powers.

May not be needed to say: in an authoritarian society, compliance paradoxically breeds more authoritarianism.

(From AI, and I agree with) The idea of the impact of compliance in authoritarian societies is .., Active Compliance > Passive Compliance > and finally, Pre-Compliance.

- Bonus: discussion of the assertion that those in upperclass authoritarian societies DO comply with, and aren't affected by authoritarian policies ( Note this is for INDIVIDUALS not corporations, I speculate it works the same however ) https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/paradox-voluntary-compliance-...

So, watch as Us here on Hacker News start to encourage Active compliance, move to Passive, and then encourage Pre-Compliance!

Then, BINGO! "You're an authoritarian enabler!"

Yeah, it has been a reckoning. I’ve never seen liberal boomers and gen x-ers get so organized. I’ve only known the opposite in my lifetime. It’s been great to see and I’m here for it. Keep this up and you’ll turn the hosts of The View into leaders of an armed militia.

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