Target

Gregg W. Steinhafel, CEO
Target Corporation
1000 Nicollet Mall #2950
Minneapolis, MN 55403

6/9/13

Dear Mr. Steinhafel,

It is with dismay that I write to you about my recent visit to your store at 360 Waterfront Dr E in Homestead, PA. I am typically a big proponent of Target stores and have shopped at them for most of my life with my family. However, upon my recent visit, I can't help but feel that the chain has a sense of inherent disdain and disrespect for its customers.

My girlfriend and I were shopping at Francesca's earlier that day, and she bought a new dress. Francesca's didn't have a nice sweater/top that matched it, so we went over to Target to try to find one. Upon selecting a few things to try on, we took them back towards the dressing rooms. The woman manning the dressing area documented every item before allowing us in as if we were a couple of vagrants or teenagers.

This alone I found disrespectful, but if it is the company's policy, I don't resent her for doing her job. However, when we walked back towards one of the dressing rooms, the woman barked out toward me in an aggressive tone, “You aren't allowed back here, sir!” Now, give me a break. I can't stand outside a dressing room and look at my girlfriend's outfits after she tries each one on? What kind of con job does Target think we are running here? Somehow my presence outside the room to help her select an outfit is going to interfere with the item count the store already documented?

I don't know what Target thinks I am – a thief, an ogler, a teenager? – but it sure has hell doesn't think of me as a paying customer. If it were me alone in the store being treated like this, I would have thrown down all of the items and left. Luckily for you, my girlfriend wanted the outfits, and I'll admit they are nice, but I can't stomach shopping at a place that doesn't respect its own clientèle. I thought you were running a department store, not a bail bond agency. We are your livelihood. We deserve to be treated with respect. I hope for your sake that this is an isolated case of a store having to resort to these tactics because it's located in a relatively bad area. If this is an undercurrent running through the whole chain, I can't believe people continue to shop there.

With regret,

Walmart

Mike Duke, CEO
Wal-Mart Stores, Inc.
702 SW 8th St
Bentonville, AR 72716

6/9/13

Dear Mr. Duke,


It is with incredulity that I write to you about my recent visit to your store at 2351 Century Dr in West Mifflin, PA. I am typically a big fan of shopping at Walmart stores, but every now and then I am completely baffled by the bizarre way they are managed. I went to this Walmart store on a Thursday night at 11:00 p.m. to pick up a few things. At this time there were two cash registered being manned. One cashier was completely occupied by a woman running some kind of extreme couponing scam who had enough stuff in her cart to stock a bunker for the end times. The other line was populated by Everyone Else. After standing in the Armageddon line for about ten minutes, I figured out that I wasn't going anywhere. Either the cashier was taking her good old time, or was just flat out baffled by how to process all of these coupons.

I took a glance at the other line, where the last (and probably 15th) person in line had a full cart of groceries. As much as I wanted hand soap and dish washing liquid for a very affordable price, I decided I wasn't willing to spend 45 minutes in line to get it, and I left my items on an end cap display. I went over to CVS where I purchased the same thing in about two or three minutes, though for several more dollars.

Now, the ridiculousness of this scenario is accentuated by the fact that there were about a hundred employees in the store stocking shelves, some making jokes and dawdling around, while 15 people stand idling in line waiting to give you money. In general, though I like the convenience of Walmart stores, when I picture them I imagine boxes and abandoned items strewn all over the place. Maybe this is part of the reason why.

Incidentally, this is not the first time I have had to abandon my items and go elsewhere, as I have done so several times at the North Versailles Walmart. This West Mifflin store is usually better, but I hope you agree that one shopper with a large quantity of items shouldn't be enough to blow out the capacity of a store to function, even if it is at an odd hour of the night.

Sincerely,