The retail landscape in Langley is going to look a bit emptier this year, with the upcoming closure of Target at Willowbrook Shopping Centre.
Mexx clothing stores also announced it is closing its Canadian stores. The Mexx store at the Power Centre on the Langley Bypass has already started its liquidating sales and plans to close its doors around the end of February.
Target opened in Langley in May 2013. Like so many other Target stores, there is no word on what could fill that large space.
Sony also announced last week that it closing its Canadian stores. The Sony store that was located on the Bypass shut down a couple years ago already.
U.S. retailer Target is abandoning its short-lived foray into Canada.
The company says it will close all 133 Canadian stores, including 19 in B.C.. It employs 17,600 people in Canada and the closures could throw thousands out of work in this province.
Target chairman CEO Brian Cornell said there was no realistic scenario for the money-losing Canadian arm to reach profitability until at least 2021.
It was granted protection from its creditors in Ontario Supreme Court last Thursday.
“We had great expectations for Canada but our early missteps proved too difficult to overcome,” Cornell said. “Personally, this was a very difficult decision, but it was the right decision for our company.”
The Minneapolis-based retailer has B.C. locations in Campbell River, Courtenay, Nanaimop, Victoria, Saanich, Burnaby, Richmond, Coquitlam, Delta, Surrey, Langley, Maple Ridge, Abbotsford, Chilliwack, Kamloops, Kelowna, Vernon, Cranbrook and Prince George.
Target stores will remain open during a court-supervised liquidation.
Target is placing $70 million in an employee trust to ensure a minimum 16 weeks compensation, including wage and benefit coverage for workers not needed for the full wind-down period.
The decision came after an unsuccessful holiday season, Cornell said, despite best efforts by Target Canada to win over shoppers.
The American retail giant launched its Canadian expansion in 2013, buying up former Zellers locations and arranging grocery stock through Sobey’s.
SFU business and marketing professor Lindsay Meredith said Target’s invasion of Canada was misguided from the start.
It launched with too many stores at once, he said, and it immediately turned off Canadians savvy to lower U.S. pricing when it instead charged prices in line with Canadian retailers.
“That was exactly what Canadians did not want to hear,” Meredith said.
When stores opened they were missing some of the U.S. brands in home decor and fashion shoppers wanted, he added.
Further blows that entrenched the retailer as a “screw-up” in Canadian minds included a massive data breach at the U.S. parent and recurring problems with empty store shelves.
“Empty shelves is a retailer’s kiss of death,” he said.
The latest challenge for Target has been the dive in the loonie to 84 cents U.S., which has left the company bridging a growing gap between what it pays for stock in the U.S. and what it sells it for in Canada.
But Meredith said he was surprised Target opted for a complete Canadian pull-out, coupled with creditor protection, rather than what he calls a “hedge hog defence” of retrenching to a small number of more profitable stores in key markets.
Big winners from Target’s demise will be Wal-Mart, Loblaws, Canadian Tire and even Sport Chek, Meredith predicted.
“All these guys will be happy – they just got rid of a major competitor that could have hurt them.”
He expects the stores will be sold piecemeal to multiple buyers “who will bite off a piece of the whale carcass” rather than to one replacement chain. Other retailers have also struggled lately, including Sears, and Jacob and Smart Set also intending to close. Meredith said Target’s withdrawal will send a warning to other U.S. retailers considering Canadian expansion, such as Nordstrom’s.
— with files from Black Press reporter Jeff Nagel