r/Target

Had some lady have 12 packs of cokes and some Gatorades in bags at the bottom of her cart. None of them had the bar code side showing and they were all stacked differently on one another. So I had to individually put each pack of coke onto the counter to scan as well as the Gatorades.

Take it from someone who has worked at Wal-Mart, BJs, Kohls, Burlington and a short stint in Barnes and Noble....

I can tell you right now that if you are staying in retail, there is no difference in the level of nonsense that you will be dealing with. All of these retail employers have the same issues, the lack of quality leadership. There are enough TLs, ETLs, and SDs (yes, SDs) who got to where they got because of the time they have in the company. Not because they have specific talent or skill for management but because they do what they needed to do to stay in the job long enough to be an expert in it. Not necessarily they have management strengths.

So that's why we suffer as peons of the system. The favoritism of leaders are so obvious and yet nothing is being done because they chalk it up to "humans being humans". We suffer in the middle of all these operational changes, because we have leaders who don't know how to manage changes like these without making it all feel like a punishment and one more thing to do.

I wish I could tell you that there is some magic formula that makes things better. But look around, the only place that is still hiring is retail. Tech sector is laying people off. Different government sectors are on different levels furlough; Manufacturing is getting killed because tariffs. Supply chain is also unstable. But retail, for better or for worse, remains as a constant employer.

Question I get asked all of the time, why Target? I think for me, the question is why this Target? For me, the people in my team are awesome. Not all of them but most of them. And for the most part, I have my TLs are reasonable. Yes they are human so there are things that go crazy on their shifts that does not seem to help anybody. My ETL is great and yeah my SD can be a bit of a jerk (actually a big one) but my ETL know how to mitigate all of these changes without driving all of us crazy. And yeah, the pay is not bad either, again for retail. Retail has never been about having livable wage (unfortunately). Retail is stop gap, now more than ever.

If your Target is becoming unbearable, don't generalize that its all Target. There are some really great leaders out there. But unfortunately, for every 1 of the great leaders, there are 2 that are just out there barely surviving.

I just started not too long ago, started in service desk, and was told i would fill in for cashiers occasionally. ok, no problem. Besides that, the whole thing is built for short people. I am 6'5 and having to bag items by my shins for 8 hours was TERRIBLE on my back today. To clarify, I was management at Walmart for 4 years. Those registers felt more ergonomic, the pos interface is infront of you as you scan items, the bags carousel is a decent height and more natural placed. Targets just seems off.

I’m the style TL, I’ve only been a TL for about 4 months now. When word got around that I had been promoted, most people were really happy about it, however, there’s a clique of style closers that have absolutely hated my guts since day 1 (before I was even promoted) but once they found out about my promotion, it just got worse. I genuinely have NO idea why they hate me and I ponder on it constantly. I’m always really nice to them and am always willing to drop whatever I’m doing to help any of my TM’s. They’re nice to my face and have never been rude directly to me. In fact, they’re incredibly kind to me. However, the minute I walk away I hear the shit talking and see the dirty looks. (Not to mention other TL’s have came to me letting me know that they drag my name through the mud when I’m not there. When I ask the TL’s if they happened to tell them why they hate me, they always say no. They just don’t like me)

When I come in after having a day off, my TM’s will come to me and tell me that the group shit talked me at the fitting room for like 30 mins straight. This happens CONSTANTLY. literally every time I come in after having a day off, word is getting back to me from TL’s or TM’s that this same group was verbally dragging me to each otherZ

I’ve been ignoring it for a year and literally don’t pay it any mind. I haven’t even told my ETL about it and we’re really close. but I’m stressing bc my HR ETL went around the store telling everyone to do the team voice survey. She specifically repeated several times “This survey is asking for your opinion on your TEAM LEAD, NOT YOUR ETL” and I know for a fact that they will drag me through the dirty at any given opportunity. I genuinely don’t know how any of this works, I’ve only been with Target for a year and have been a TL for 4 months. If you get bad reviews on your team voice survey, do you get chewed out? I know all of my other TM’s will rave about me. It’s just this specific group of 4 older ladies that have me stressing

Hello everyone! I am an 18 year old, soon to be 19 year old, college student. I recently started working at my city’s target. It is actually my first job ever. I am very excited to get out of the house and help my mom out.

I am a checkout advocate, and I enjoy my job a lot so far! I like scanning guests’ items, and having a positive attitude with them! I do have to constantly ask for help from other employees since I am new, but I didn’t come across any big problems so far.

I just found this sub a few minutes ago. Since I am a new employee at target, and new in the work force in general, I figure I join this sub and ask some questions I have about working at target, if that’s okay of course. My mom is also a target employee, and I ask her questions all the time, but I feel it wouldn’t hurt to ask from others too!

A lot of times, when I finish scanning the guests’ items, the target circle message pops up. The one that says “read this to our guests.” Normally I just read the first sentence of the message.

Am I supposed to read the whole message? Or is the first sentence good? Am I also supposed to know what target circle is? Not just read it, but know what it is to explain to guests if they ask about it? I am sure I have to, but if anyone can explain to me what target circle is, I would appreciate it!

Secondly, I ran into a guest that wanted to use their coupon when I was scanning their items. How do I use the coupon? Do I have to scan it and it’ll automatically take it (if not expired)? Or am I mistaken?

Thirdly, if you guys want to, what is your experience at target like? I know it’ll be different for everyone, but just out of curiosity. That’s all.

Thanks!

SD came in yesterday and gave us a few new notes. We were told that we can’t use the big clothing rack in the fitting room to push anymore and now we’re only allowed to use the small white racks. The problem is those racks are tiny, so now I have to make like 5 trips back and forth just to push all the women’s clothing and clearance. On the weekend we get at least 100 Levi pants/shorts as reshop and those aren’t even going to fit in that small ass white rack basket.

We can’t use the Z racks anymore either. We used those for the bathing suits, but now we’re supposed to figure something else out on where to put them when we only have 3(!!!) white racks total and one them stays in reshop. So where exactly are all these bathing suits supposed to go? It’s considered a slow day today and we already have two full Z-racks worth of swimsuits. How is that supposed to fit on a white racks plus our reshop clothing?

Not to mention those white racks feel like they were spawned straight from hell. They remind me of those razor scooters from when we were kids because they swing all over the place, run over your foot, and slam into your ankles nonstop.

HR said the reason for all these changes is to make sure guests are the number one priority, but honestly this is going to kill efficiency even more. We’re already struggling as it is. I went home crying today because of all the work I had to push and zone.

We had a customer who found an item in the wrong location and because it was in a cabinet (and thus only a TM could have made that mistake), a team lead approved us matching the price of the item they found to what was on the label in that location. Issue is, the price difference was greater than $50. Because of the price change limit (not sure if it’s $50), we could not adjust the price of the item, or add a custom item with or without a DPCI (because of the price limit of custom items). Also even the TL couldn’t override it.
We had to very awkwardly explain to the customer that our system wouldn’t allow it, but now I’m wondering, what would you have done?

Had a lady tonight get snippy with her at sco because I couldn’t get to her right away

Our service desk is connected to the sco, so as she called me over I had someone come to my sco register

I thought she was polite when she said I could come over when I get a minute

I told her politely that I would be over in a moment

2 minutes later she goes “um? I need help over here.”

Me: *politely almost in a gentle parent voice* “I know ma’am but I’ll be over there in a minute okay?”

Her: “well I thought you heard me the first time I called you over.”

Me: “I did ma’am, I told you I’d be right over, I’m currently with another guest.”

Her: “Well I thought you’d be over right away

Me: *dumbfounded face* “You said when I get a chance, I’ll be over in a minute. I cannot be in two places at once.”

Fucking, WHEN I SAY ID BE OVER IN A MINUTE ID BE OVER IN A MINUTE.

Small question, is there anything like extra pay working memorial day or no? As well im on demand so anything different

I miss when this company handed out overtime like candy to inbound TL’s and TM’s. Now as a lead I get coached for 30 minutes when I already start off with an hour because of perimeter pay. I get it in theory because you shouldn’t need OT if you run a good process but some weeks are hard🤣

started drafting this post like a minute ago and accidentally closed out of my tab and none of it saved. just what i needed honestly!!!!! this post is extremely long and probably nonsensical at times but i just need to get it off my shoulders.

anyway: i posted earlier during my break just venting but i am genuinely considering promoting myself to guest. i've only worked here two months & some change, and in those two months i've not only experienced but witnessed harassment, intimidation, toxicity, and overall shit behavior from my TLs. yes, i know retail is hell. yes, i know that guests are going to give you shit. but the disrespect from our LEADERS is fucking atrocious.

first off: style gets a lot of shit, at least at MY STORE. we are a p-fresh target, so our style department takes up half (if not more) of the store. our TLs tell us that we're the highest paid department, but i'm not sure if that's true or if it's just something they say to get us to do things that are way above our pay grade. we have to cover tech's breaks, be backup at the registers (they don't call up any other sales floor team, JUST STYLE!!!), we have to hang and organize the reshop at the service desk because god forbid they hang and fold things neatly for us instead of just throwing it all into a plastic bin or 3 tier. also they give us a busted ass card reader zebra to do save the sales with and are surprised when we barely get any. the device is BROKEN!!! and no one will come and take it back to the front to be plugged in so it's always dead when the openers come in!

our TLs expect us to push out a 10 hour truck within 4 hours or less, not accounting for the time spent backstocking, pushing reshop from the service desk and the fitting room, locking and unlocking and locking and unlocking and locking the fitting room stalls over and over and over again, being backup at the front lanes, zoning our areas and picking up the guest's trash (because god forbid they throw their starbucks in a TRASH CAN instead of leaving it on a shelf!), covering for the tech boat and unlocking the electronics/beauty stockroom for the people who need to be let in and don't have a key, we have to be our own asset protection team because apparently it's OUR responsibility if a guest is tampering with an item (hello? WHAT ARE THE CAMERAS FOR?), all the while being told that we're too slow, we need to drop everything we're doing for a project like redoing the entire shoes section, and our zoning is awful.

jesus christ. i actually can't take it any more?? i've only ever worked retail jobs and have had some crazy things happen to me, but holy shit target is genuinely the worst. i don't think i've known such immaturity until meeting my TLs.

this is what really set me off: the other day, a truck day, it was only me and two other people. why? because they don't schedule anyone else. no one called out, they just think that three people are capable of running an entire 10 hour truck within the first half of our shift. so, obviously, we weren't able to do that. it was about an hour before i was going to leave and we were all at the fitting room to sort through the reshop and clear out the stalls. we're talking and working at the same time, and my TL comes up and is telling us that we really need to get truck done. and, yes, of course, i want to get truck done too. i don't want to come in and have to push truck on a non truck day, so i understand her perspective. she has a lot of drive and wants things done, well so do i!!! i love getting things done!!!

anyway, my coworker says something along the lines of "there's a lot of shoes to be pushed out, and i don't think i'll be able to get to it because of all the reshop that needs to be pushed out." okay, understandable. we usually get like 20 boxes of shoes and have to backstock at least 4 boxes worth on bigger truck days. and do you know what my TL does in response to that? she snaps her fingers at all of us, calling us slow and telling us to "get going on that". holy shit it made me SO uncomfortable. as someone on the spectrum with level 1 autism, i felt extremely targeted, no pun intended. i never disclosed on my application that i was autistic because i was worried that i wouldn't be hired (i had applied several times to target before and always disclosed it, and the one time i didn't... i got hired... hm!), but after i did get hired it was pretty obvious to everyone that i am autistic. don't know why, but that's just the way it is. no one really cares, but there are times where someone will say something and it's like... can you be a little sensitive?

anyway. after this happened, everyone was shocked that our TL would do something like that. it felt extremely disrespectful, especially because our TL is a white woman and we are all minorities. i pretty much begged my coworker to go to HR about this, and that we would all vouch for her as well. she said she would talk to our ETL; and she did apparently, but guess what? our ETL didn't GAF. she was literally laughing and talking with our TL the next day as if nothing happened. and our TL never even apologized to us. in fact, she IGNORED all of us and glared at us when she thought we weren't looking, then had the audacity to comment on our guest service. like, i'm sorry i didn't greet that guest whose back was facing me and who was also on the phone and asked him if he needed help finding anything, or, "who are you shopping for", jesus!!!

this TL is widely known to be unsympathetic as well. there was one time i was pushing truck with my coworker who is in a wheelchair and couldn't reach some items on her metro, so of course i helped her out; and we were talking about this TL, and my coworker said "she has zero empathy, like she's without a soul, it's like she's not even human". and i laughed and said that was crazy, but now i really see what she means. because i witnessed this first hand.

i'm still in my 90 days, and i've called out twice. once because i was ill, the second time because my cat had passed away unexpectedly. even when having my fucking cat cremated, i was worried and anxious about what my TL would say about my absence. that really tells you a lot, right? anyway, i went into work the next day, swallowing my emotions and slapping that happy guest service loving robot face on, did my work, did my work WELL, and guess what? my TL asks to meet her in the back, and proceeds to pry about why i called out. i was so caught off guard by it, so i told her my cat died. she looked me dead in the eyes and said, "it's really easy to be let go for calling out within your 90 days."

holy shit. you actually are not human. i have a life outside of work, as do you, as does everyone else. i actually felt like i was being lobotomized in that moment because??? what??? i don't know WHY she asked, because i am not obligated at all to tell her why i called out. but she caught me so off guard and kept asking over and over again, i felt like i had no choice. on top of that, she gossiped about it with our other TLs and presumably our ETL, because our ETL asked me about it later that day. and on top of THAT, my cat was dead! oh my god, i just cannot take it any more!

i literally spent both of my breaks today searching for other jobs. unfortunately, it's nothing but retail for miles. and i don't have a car! so i'm basically just fucked. i would have liked to have a conversation with our HR rep today, but she left before i could talk to her. and you know what? i'm even hesitant about that. because what if she doesn't take me seriously? no one else does! and what if she's also buddy buddy with our ETL and TLs that call us slow and treat us like shit? i was thinking about going on-demand, but i don't know if i'm allowed to even ask for that within my 90 days. i just want to get out of this shithole. i genuinely think this bullshit about "getting target back to the way it was" is making everyone a worse person. but yeah let's get super strict about the dress code and greet and smile at every guest within a 10 mile radius because that'll get our sales back up. fuck you