News @lemmy.world

10mo ago

A 40-day Target boycott starts today. It couldn’t come at a worse time for the company

www.cnn.com /2025/03/05/business/target-boycott-jamal-bryant/index.html

Had no idea a boycott was happening.

169 comments

Can we add bigger offenders like Wal-Mart and Amazon?
- Right? And why not just boycott all pubkically traded companies forever? 40 days doesn't do much
  
  Because if you propose that, no one is actually going to do it.
  Doing something is always more impactful than shooting for everything and ending up doing nothing. This is a great example of a smartly thought out mass movement; it has a specific goal, and a clearly defined set of terms. Remember, you can always expand or extend. It's far better to get a small thing moving than try to build a big thing that you never finish.
  
  I'm definitely with you on that in spirit. I would starve if I actually practiced that across the board. I figure if we start from the top down, maybe we can get the co-ops to come back. Our neighborhood co-op grocery closed down not too long ago, and all that's left are national chains.
  
  Better than these one day protests that LITERALLY do nothing. At least a 40 day boycott would hit a fiscal month, vs a single day outlier protest.
- That is the part that pisses me off so much about this. Yes. Target capitulated. Yes, Target needs to be told that's not good.
  BUT WALTONS FUND THE HERITAGE FOUNDATION!
  This can't be said enough, yet we can't get a days boycott on them for fucks sake!
  
  Exactly why Walmart should be PERMANENTLY BOYCOTTED!
  
  People need awareness, motivation and organization. If you can help with that, go for it.
  
  https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/fact-check-project-2025s-heritage-foundation-donors-have-included-coors-walmart-and-exxonmobil/ar-BB1pPBTC
  Looks like the Federalist Society is connected, too. It's like the Who's Who of Homogeny, Exclusion, and Inequity. Somebody give me an L-word so we can call them what they are.
  I'm not doing the whole "Everyone I don't agree with is a Nazi." I mean, very specifically, this is the strategy used by unaccountable, ultrawealthy people to wield their power recklessly for an extremist movement that they're going to lose control of. It just happens to be the best-known, contemporary archetypal, right-wing-flavor of the revolutionary bait-and-switch.
- Join me, I’ve been boycotting them for years.
- There is supposed to be a weeklong boycott of Amazon this month, I forget the exact date.
  
  March 7-14

It couldn’t come at a worse time for the company
Neither could their capitulation to Trumps bigoted rhetoric.
I got a lot of flak and eye rolls from my liberal friends a few years ago when I, as a queer woman, would criticize their Rainbow Capitalism. But Target is not an ally, they never were. They are simply a corporation that got some easy publicity in liberal spaces by showing the bare minimum decency.
Fair weather allies, aren't.
- Just to build on this. No publicly traded company is an ally to any group but its shareholders.
  
  That's why it's our responsibility as consumers to align their shareholder interests to doing the right fucking thing. Boycotts and other consumer action are part of their calculations on what the shareholder interests are, so a large population of informed consumers who vote their conscience with their wallet will provide pressure to do the right thing.
- Target is under more pressure than companies like Walmart, John Deere or Tractor Supply, because Target went further in its DEI efforts, and it has a more progressive base of customers than those competitors.
  This is wild move for a company on its arse anyway.

Damn and here I am participating in this boycott for so long without even trying.
Target sucks.

There's a boycott? I just don't shop there because it's the same crap as everywhere else for more money and a worse experience.
- I know right I can just buy it on Amazon /s
  
  Nah Amazon is cheaper and a better experience. Don't get me wrong, there's plenty of reasons not to shop at Amazon, but price and shopping experience are above Target.
  
  Unsarcastically but sadly, yes. It's the same items, with the same supply chain and the same issues. But it's at a lower cost to me. Frankly, as things get tight, we'll all need to make decisions between our ideals and our bank accounts. I assume that most of us will lean toward preserving the bank account and reckon with our ideals later.

My wife told me we are boycotting, so lets do this!
I have 3 trans friends and as a super straight middle aged privileged all to hell white dad, fuck these corporate assholes.
- My wife lives at Target. She's already found other places to get the essentials.
  40 days.
  Fill a target online shopping cart with every day items, stuff you would buy every week or every month, and abandon it. Nothing big or expensive, standard shit.
  Do that a few times.
  
  Are you Frank Whely and is your wife Jennifer Connelly?

I've been boycotting Target for months now
- When they took down all their pride stuff to appease the far right, I never looked back.
  
  Ending DEI was it for me

Dear capitalist media... Target is being boycotted for being racist. And no, Target is not the victim.
These headlines ffs...
- It's CNN. They're a heavily biased pro-Israel pro-capitalist align-with-whatever-regime corpo news service. They should just be ignored by all at this point.
- Wait, Target's racist?
  
  They canceled their black creator products and rolled back DEI because the government said to.
  Some people can argue that's not racism, but they're likely the same people that argue that Elon wasn't giving a Nazi salute.

Putting a time limit on a boycott undermines the boycott.
Saw this with the Loblaw’s boycott here in Canada, it was very ineffective because they can just wait it out.
- From the point of view of the boycotter, having a time limit helps mentally.
  I think more people are ready to think "just buy somewhere else for a bit". If it becomes "forever" might seem daunting.
  My two cents, not sure if this is the real reason.
  
  That's my thought as well. A one day boycott like the "no shopping day" does literally nothing, but 40 days can reform habits. To the extent practicable, I'm doing all my shopping at Costco now. I generally eat a lot of the same things, so bulk quantities aren't that big of a deal to manage.
- Yes, just don't shop at Target.
  It's strange that people forget that businesses like Target getting rid of DEI also gets rid of many disability act initiatives. There should be more outrage than just a boycott.
- Does Loblaw run a law blog by any chance?
  
  Sadly no there is no Bob Loblaw
- But why would people boycott a law blog?

Remember there are bots even on Lemmy to push the narrative that we have no power. Billionaires aren't scared of a couple less dollars, but they are TERRIFIED of us figuring out we can organize. Let's not fight each other let's fight the oligarchy!
- We only have power when a large enough group of us does something. Anything else is publicity.
  
  I urge you to see beyond that. Of course there are people (influencers likely?) you're thinking about that jump on band wagons, but every movement does and they play an important part even if you don't like them. Free advertising!

Using gift cards is OK if you're boycotting a place, right? I mean, Target already has the money and you'd just be helping them out if you didn't buy anything with them.
I'm a school bus driver and I always get a lot of tips (Christmas and end of year) in the form of Target gift cards. BTW yes, I agree that tipping school bus drivers is fucking weird. We already get paid and it's not like we're going to drive the kids into a tree if we don't get tipped.
- Those are Christmas gifts. The parents are just showing appreciation for you already not driving their kids into a tree, not bribing you lol.
  
  No, it’s definitely bribes lol
- Not really. The explanation is somewhat complex.
  Although target already has the money once a gift card has been purchased, they will not recognise the money as revenue until you use the card.
  Suppose my lawn mowing guy charges $50 each time he mows my lawn, and he comes 12 times a year. In January I just transfer him $600 because I don't want to muck around with smaller payments all the time.
  When he calculates his "revenue" for January, should he include the whole $600? It would be more accurate to set aside the $550 he hadn't really earned yet, and recognise that once he actually does the work.
  There's more geaky accounting stuff I could say, but in summary if you want to send a message to Target management, refrain from using gift cards during the boycott.
  
  They don't get to record it as revenue, but they do get to sit on the cash, earning interest etc on it. Companies loooove gift cards. It's free money.
  For a company health perspective, it's better to use it so they're at least put the cost-of-goods. Best option would be to sell the gift cards to someone who was going to shop there anyways.
- I'll allow it.
- In my old community the bus driver was part of our community, we knew her and she was amazing. She knew the kids, she welcomed them by name every morning and she made sure they got to school safe AND ok.
  The last bit is the most important part. She deserved a “tip” but in reality as someone who was part of my extended “raise my kid family” she “earned” her card and Starbucks gift card (mostly cuz she drank 7-11 coffee and I liked razzing her)
  Our current bus driver is a contractor who couldn’t give a fuck about anything except when he has to be at the stop and when he is allowed to leave, exactly where the “nah you’re too far away from the bus stop fuck you’d kid” line is.”
  It’s not always weird, but can be.
- We already get paid and it’s not like we’re going to drive the kids into a tree if we don’t get tipped.
  You might not do it, I however am always looking for revenue streams. If it’s for profit, it can’t be illegal.
  Looks at the health insurance industry

I used to pretty regularly shop at target. When they rolled back DEI proactively for trump, I stopped.
- Target near me made their employees stay inside/keep working while it was evacuated for a bomb threat during that period of stochastic terrorism.
- I had heard about the boycott, but didn't realize this was the reason. Target's on the other side of town from me so I don't shop there anyway, but yeah definitely not going there at all now. Fuck them.
  
  It's "funny" how capitalist media will talk about the boycott and cry agonized tears for Target...
  But never mention the "why", especially not in headlines.

Already been boycotting target
- My partner and I had our first children (twins) about a year ago. They're great.
  Before then, I rarely if ever went to this type of store. We don't have a local Target but we have K-Mart which I think is comparable in Australia.
  Honestly I think we've done pretty well at buying most of what we need second hand, and then selling it on once it's no longer required. We also get toys from a local toy library which is amazing.
  That said, I've sadly become a semi-regular K-Mart shopper because I require some of the cheap plastic junk they sell. A good example is shoes, I can buy a pair of shoes for the kids for less than the cost of a cup of coffee.
  The thing is, everything about the store is repulsive. It's basically a plastic shop. They sell plastic. Even the clothing and shoes is polyester and nylon and plasticised rubber. Also, since we're here, if I'm really honest about it I would have to assume that the person who made my kids shoes is probably being exploited. That sucks.
  Anyhow, I don't really have a point, just having a whinge and acknowledging that target / kmart is definitely the worst part of having a child.
  
  Similar here. We used to be great at avoiding the corporate stores until we had a kid. Convenience and selection wins when you're overstressed and sleep deprived.
  I think we've done great at rolling back to local-only shopping this year. No Amazon, no target. Costco still gets out visits, but overall we're being much more thoughtful about who gets our money and we're spending significantly less also.

Been boycotting them since my local one let ICE use their back parking lot to stage up and detain folks

Been part of a boycott for decades and didn't even know
- I felt the same way about Budweiser
  
  Wish I was a tiefling IRL 😔

I work at the Target warehouse that supplies the northwest, should be interesting to see if this actually noticeably changes our daily product volume. Gonna hazard a guess at no probably not. I should have some idea within 24 hours thanks to just in time logistics but seasonal product could fuzz the numbers a bit.
Works for me though, I'm mostly here for the tuition benefit and I don't lose benefits eligibility unless I dip below 20/hr/week average which I can't imagine happening.
Update: Maybe, actually. Today was the lowest volume so far this week but we're just sorta back to the volume we were running last week. We'll see if it sticks.
Update 2: lol, today's volume is even higher than last week. It's just volatile right now I guess, no discernible impact.

Every time I've gone into a target in the last 5 years, they legit looked like they were closing down. Idk why people are boycotting them in particular when Walmart and Amazon are way worse.
- Every Target I go to is nicer than Walmart and has a more curated feel of products. I agree on the last part but it's because Target was advertising itself as being more in touch with things such as DEI and then backtracked, where Walmart and Amazon never positioned themselves as much.
  
  Target's thing has always been to be "Walmart but fancy". Fun fact, the last "T" is actually silent, and you're supposed the pronounce it "Tar-jay"
- Same, I get major K-Mart in its final days vibes: lots of empty shelves, stuff in dented and torn packaging, hostile and surly employees etc. etc.
  Browsing through the Target grocery section has always mystified me. Not great selection and everything costs about 50% more than the local grocery stores. I have never understood why anybody would shop there for groceries.
  
  Yeah, Kmart vibes is accurate.
  There was a time when Target had a middle class demo they...targeted. But that demo is too small now. They're either going to need to shrink and market to the top 10%, competing with Whole Foods, or lower their standards and compete with Amazon. Oof, gotta love monopolies. Starting to think this boycott was Bezos' idea.
  
  The Rite Aid near us actually was 3/4 empty all through the pandemic. They put up a sign saying they were remodeling, but closed a few months ago.
- Our Target is in pretty good shape, always busy. Wonder what the difference is…locale? Management?
- i can tell you why - because it's easy. this is slacktivism. it changes nothing about policy. it exists exclusively to make people feel better about capitulating and doing nothing to prevent their country from becoming a fascist dictatorship
  
  "Hey! That store you don't shop at? Make sure you continue to not shop there for the next 40 days! That'll show the elites!"

Every one of these idiot companies pivoting to cowboy capitalism from rainbow capitalism are clueless about who actually has money in this country.
- The billionaires?
  
  Sorry, money they're actually willing to spend at a store.
  Billionaires can't buy anything at stores, after all "IT's NOt LIQuID". 😜
  PS: I know that they can buy shit at stores with their lifetime loans while keeping their assets 100% intact, but what billionaire is going to shop regularly at Target?

I had no idea either. But I also haven't been to target in about 6 months and I've been boycotting pretty much everywhere else since last year. I haven't even done online shopping since October and it's been kinda nice going to actual stores again. Was gonna get a Costco membership next so I don't have to use Kroger. Unfortunately, the nearest Costco to me is about an hour away. Fortunately, I like driving.
- Start paying cash so payment processors don't get their fees and they can't sell your info.
- I think this is the smart thing to do right now. I applaud.
- This reads like an Improv exercise and I LOVE IT! Unfortunately I can only get so hard.

Instead if 40 days, let's try 40 months.
- Let's make them the next kmart

Oh good I’ll continue to not shop there

I was boycotting them from the point where I quit the job in logistics. That job was awful.

I used to do nearly all my shopping there because of the policies they got rid of. Cancelled my 360 membership, getting used to buying flour 25# at a time from Costco ...

Boycotting Target and Walmart.

Boycotting them since Jan. 1. 😎
- Is that when they dropped DEI?
  Because that's when I stopped shopping there. Didn't need to wait to be told and have no plans to end the boycott after 40 days or anytime. Not sure if bringing back DEI would change my mind. They played us.

Shut Target down! NEVER shopping there again!

don't know why, don't care, let's do it
- Capitalist media certainly isn't going to explain it either. Poor Target!!! \s

Please stop with the time bound protests. You're telling the companies to just wait you out. 🤦‍♀️
- Yes, stop protesting if you aren't willing to protest the right way. There are no steps to be taken in the right direction, you're either perfect or worthless.

well that's easy, I haven't shopped there in years. They're inconvenient, overpriced, low quality, rarely have what I'm looking for. Why would I shop there?

Why do we hate Target again? No really I'm out of the loop and I'm not reading an article written by a company owned by the Far Right
- Rolled back DEI initiatives, also caved to conservative pressure about the tuck friendly swimsuit thing and whatever else they were outraged about.
  
  Ah, good reasons

I wish I was working for target so I can take a nap at work.

Why are people boycotting a company that tried and took a step back due to backlash instead of supporting them when they tried?
- The article certainly outlines a few reasons:
  Target “embraced” the idea of rolling back DEI policies more than many companies, furthering its weird cultish “belonging to the bullseye” internal culture.
  Target’s customers are more progressive than Walmart, John Deere, or Ford, so more of them actually care about what the company is doing.
  Target previous embraced DEI more than other companies. Them previously doing so and then promptly shedding it seems that their corporate culture is one of quarterly gains rather than giving a shit about anybody. While that’s true for pretty much all publicly traded corporations, see point 2.
  
  Target throwing themselves at Rainbow Capitalism is one pile of evidence that points at their movement being on the whim of the dollar as opposed to strong corporate ethics
- I shopped there nearly exclusively because of what they had been doing. Now that they're embracing fascism, I'm not.
  
  Source on embracing fascism? I jumped from Amazon to Target because Bezos and friends were sitting together at the inauguration.

Easiest. Boycott. Ever.
Target sells cheaply manufactured goods at high prices. I haven't shopped there in years already for that reason.
- I like to go there to buy thermos. They have a clearance section that sells them for like $5. Big good ones too.
  Oh and their cheap $1 aisle that sells seasonal stuff. I like going there for Christmas time and buying cheap Christmas decorations for the workplace lol.

Good. Fuck em.

I don't shop at Target because their stores smell weird and it's a sensory issue.

Hive mind, why are we mad at you target? Did a rich asshole make a shitty decision?
- Yeah. Read the article.
- Headlines from capitalist media won't answer these questions. They're too busy crying for Target. Gotta look it up.

boycotts dont work, guys. keep trying, though! maybe try something a bit more proactive?
just an idea, maybe you could try recording a video of minecraft gameplay where a 1:1 scale recreation of the white house is destroyed in a fire?
edit: please read my other comment replies before replying, thanks!
- If you truly believed this, you'd not be here. You'd come here in 40 days to poke fun, but you'd not bother with us because you know that the effect will be zero. That you're here tells me that you, or much more likely your masters because you don't have an original thought in your mind, are afraid that this will actually get momentum and affect Target's stock price and sales figures. Thanks for the vote of confidence! Let's get boycotting!
  
  here's a question - if you had a friend who was making a mistake, would you try to encourage them to reconsider?
  if you think I would poke fun at you, you have absolutely the wrong idea about my motivations. i don't want you to fail, i want you to succeed. i just know that this boycott won't achieve anything, and all of the time and energy put into it will be completely wasted.
  i want people to take all of that time and energy and put it towards something that will actually achieve something meaningful. i want people to join a union and find a local activist group, and start actually making connections, building solidarity, and taking collective action that actually will accomplish something!
- Or maybe you could try having someone proofread your post ideas
  
  do you genuinely think that i'm wrong? do you truly believe in your heart that a 40 day boycott of a single big box store will help people?
  we're literally watching the united states become a fascist dictatorship and you believe that this is an appropriate response?
  people are suffering and dying because of us, and we're congratulating ourselves for buying stuff on amazon instead of target for 40 days? seriously?
  i don't need a proofreader. i need people to wake up and actually do something, not waste everyone's time and energy with performative bullshit that achieves nothing other than making us feel like we're not doing nothing.
- Slashing the profits of a $60bil company doesn't do anything.
  Lol, Lmao
  
  yes, it does literally nothing. even if nobody shopped at target ever again it would change absolutely nothing. they'd go into administration, get bought by some other corporation, and possibly rebrand. wealthy people would likely profit from short selling the stock.
  target isn't the problem. the problem is the system. you can't change the system by boycotting some random business. i am begging you to do literally any other form of activism. because this aint it.
  luigi, now there's a guy with bolder ideas.

169 comments