Some of Target's suppliers are on edge.
Since Brian Cornell became its chief executive last year, the Minneapolis-based retailer made headlines by closing its Canadian stores and laying off nearly 2,000 corporate employees. He's also leading a re-evaluation of every product Target sells, prioritizing some categories while de-emphasizing others.
For vendors, it's an unsettling time as they wonder where their products will rank on Target's reconfigured priority list. Will they get as much shelf space as in the past? Or will they be shrunk down to make room for up-and-coming products or one of Target's private-label brands?
That air of uncertainty hung over a workshop held by Kantar Retail, a consulting firm, in Minneapolis this week to brief Target vendors on the state of the company.
"Everything seems to be on the table there," Leon Nicholas, a Kantar senior vice president, told the suppliers. "The last thing you should do is do nothing. … Things are going to change."
In conversations outside the meeting, several suppliers privately said they were closely watching the company's reorganization. One food vendor whose products do not appear to be on Target's priority list said he was worried about losing premium space, in the check-out lane and on the end of aisles, to brands viewed as "healthier."
Another vendor, whose products appear to be a high priority, said her worry wasn't about shelf space but just getting basic work done amid the upheaval at Target's headquarters.
The retooling at Target is an example of a broader shift in retailing toward more local, natural and craft products, a change that's put large makers of consumer packaged goods on alert, said Jason Long, a St. Louis-based retail consultant with Shift Marketing Group.