'Gradually gone downhill': Target shoppers mourn end of 'institution'
Somewhere between the '90s and today, Target lost its spunk. That's the message from Victorian shoppers when they heard the news that dozens of the chain's stores would be closing.
Target department stores were an institution for many families who bought kids' toys, clothing, homewares and serve-yourself lollies.
Hing Wood outside Target in Camberwell.Credit:Simon Schluter
For Hing Wood's three children, going to the local Target in Camberwell was a weekend outing.
"I remember asking my now 18-year-old when she was a six-year-old, what she would do if she won TattsLotto." The answer? Buy a $1000 Target voucher.
"A gift card was her ultimate aim. I'm like, really? For a six-year-old, that just shows you what Target meant at the time," Ms Wood says.
She said the toy sales even took up conversations with her friends, planning gifts for Christmas and birthdays.
"It was a bit of a way of life. I still know some of the staff at Camberwell Target. Isn't that sad?"
Target on Bourke Street on Friday.Credit:Eddie Jim
Her adult children no longer shop at the mid-range department store and go instead to Kmart, a cheaper chain.
Target and Kmart are owned, along with Bunnings and Coles, by the Perth-based conglomerate Wesfarmers which announced on Friday that it would shut up to 75 Target stores and convert another 92 into Kmart stores.
Claire Morganella still has two Target windcheaters from the 1990s, one in hot pink, the other blue.
"I still wear them at the beach, hot pink and blue, my children probably stare at me in horror but they're really warm and comfortable – I don't care," Ms Morganella said.
"My kids are in their 30s now, but when they were five or six onwards you'd rush down to the nearest Target and get them windcheaters, trackpants. They were really bright and colourful.
Her local store at Knox City is often empty, she said, and she feels the quality in fabrics have declined over the decades.
"[Target has] just gradually gone downhill," Ms Morganella said. "I find it sad ... [it was] a real institution."
The Target store in Sunbury is quiet these days too, says Prue Scott. She also found the quality had declined, but she still has some gems.
"Every year, they have a gorgeous A-line dress that has pockets that's amazing. Every year there's one and I've probably got one from every year.
"You pull out the one from 2012 and it's probably as good a quality as it was in 2012. The quality is just fabulous."
Some of the newer pieces of clothing might only last two or three years, she guesses.
Staffer Isabel McDonald of Target in Burwood with the Lay-By room clock full of Christmas orders in 1989.Credit:Jack Atley
"Some of the older ones, they could probably last a lifetime. But I think that's part of the world today, we just don't make things to last forever unfortunately."
Ms Scott said Sunbury and her home town of Bendigo would both be worse off if their Target stores closed. Several readers have told The Age that losing Target would have a big impact on country communities.
Glen Iris woman and Target shareholder Sally McBride dressed her children – now aged in their 30s – in Target clothes as children and is now doing the same for her grandkids.
"I think it's been marvellous, all the underclothes, kids' jarmies," she said.
"I have given my grandchildren every season, a boy and a girl, a full set from Target. They go out and they wreck them and I've been very, very happy to do that.
"For everyday, knocking about at home at the weekends, jarmies and things, I always get it from Target."
Target is a Victorian-grown business of nearly 100 years.
According to the company's own history, in 1926 two men, George Lindsay and Alex McKenzie, opened a drapery store in Geelong selling mainly fabrics, manchester and furnishings.
The $ 1.3-million Target store at Mt. Gambier in 1973.
By 1968 the single store had grown from one to 14 stores across Victoria.
Ownership continued to change over the decades resulting in a merger between Fosseys department stores and Target in 1996. Three years later, Fosseys stores were all converted to Target stores.
In late 2006 Myer divested from the ownership group and Target fell under the umbrella of Coles Group Limited. The next year, Target was acquired by Wesfarmers as part of the Wesfarmers acquisition of the Coles Group.