Target Targeting Restaurant Employees

 

Food retailer’s lookout, Target is coming after your employees. Restaurants, Convenience Stores, Grocery Stores and Dollar Stores are going to soon be feeling the effect of Target stores raising its starting wage to anywhere from $15 an hour to $24 an hour, depending on the job and the local market. 

According to Steven Johnson, Grocerant Guru® at Tacoma, WA based Foodservice Solutions® the scramble for employees within the food space just got much more difficult. Between Costco, Amazon, and Target offering a full range of benefits and full-time work, it will be much harder to recruit good team members.

Targets new wage range covers hourly employees working at Target stores, supply-chain facilities and headquarters locations. The move is meant to "position Target as a wage leader in every market in which we operate." 

Target Chief Human Resources Officer Melissa Kremer, stated, "Our team is at the heart of our strategy and success, and their energy and resilience keep us at the forefront of meeting the changing needs of our guests year after year," …."We want all team members to be better off for working at Target, and years of investments in our culture of care, meaningful pay, expanded health care benefits and opportunities for growth have been essential to helping our team members build rewarding careers."  Now Target went on to say it will invest up to $300 million more in its workforce in the coming year. 

In a Battle for Employees

You Can Win

Here is where it hurt restaurants, as Target also said that employees working a minimum average of 25 hours per week will be eligible for more benefits, sooner. Beyond shortening the waiting period for enrolling in benefits, Target said that it has expanded fertility benefits and doula reimbursement in most health plans for 2022 and that most plans also will offer free virtual physical therapy and acupuncture coverage. Employees will have quicker access to 401(k) saving plans, as well, according to the company. 

In case you forgot, in August, Target announced that it was offering fee-free tuition to full- and part-time U.S. team members through a partnership with Guild Education and more than 40 colleges, universities and other educational institutions. What are you selling, and how are you selling it?  Is it time to adjust your business model and meal solutions options?

Invite Foodservice Solutions® to complete a Grocerant ScoreCard, or for product positioning or placement assistance, or call our Grocerant Guru®.  Since 1991 Foodservice Solutions® of Tacoma, WA has been the global leader in the Grocerant niche. Contact: Steve@FoodserviceSolutions.us or 253-759-7869