I Spent Over $6,000 At Target Last Year. Here’s Why I’m Giving Up My Favorite Place To Shop.
Goodbye, Spot. Farewell, Circle bonuses. And you, Drive Up, I’ll miss you most of all.
Target-loving thoughts zip through my head faster than a runaway red cart as my finger hovers over the bullseye icon on my phone screen. Do I uninstall the Target shopping app or keep it?
I’ve been overthinking my Target spending since last week when the company’s memo to employees about the conclusion of its diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) efforts made headlines in the national news and my hometown newspaper, The Minnesota Star Tribune. The reversal of Target’s commitment to supporting social justice advancements hurts, especially because I’ve always thought of Target as a liberal-friendly business.
Target earned my loyalty in 2020 when it made contactless shopping hassle-free, kept masks in stock during the COVID-19 pandemic and increased diversity efforts after the George Floyd protests. Mindfulness is a big reason I’m so attached to my Target app — mindfulness on Target’s part for recognizing big corporations’ role in helping right some of history’s wrongs, and mindfulness for me, too.
Shopping in the app and picking up my orders in the parking lot helps me stick to my shopping list and not get distracted by attractive end caps and impulse aisle goods. However, when I read that Twin Cities Pride — the organization that puts on Minneapolis’s biggest queer celebration — disinvited Target from this year’s festivities, I knew it was time to consider deleting the Target app and effectively ending my most significant retail relationship.
But my finger hesitates.
My mom-of-three lifestyle depends on Target runs. Keeping the app would mean I could still click a week’s worth of groceries or a seasonal school wardrobe into my virtual cart. Then, I could drive to the nearest Target, where a friendly red-shirted employee would load my purchases into the back of my minivan.
I scroll through my purchase history to take a look at what I’d miss: the LEGO Advent Calendars, the Cat & Jack joggers and, crucially, the Market Pantry Cheese-Filled Breadsticks, a frozen, ultra-processed staple of my family’s weekly meal plan that I can’t find at any local grocer. I add up my 2024 Drive Up purchases. The total? $6,270.73.
On its face, $6,270.73 looks extravagant, but it actually represents mainly practical purchases, like groceries, apparel and school supplies for my family of five — household essentials like lawn care bags and toilet paper. Target’s attempt to compete with Sephora even lets me buy fancy skincare and sunscreen along with kitchen sponges and sympathy cards. Last year, Target helped me sell my home and buy a new one. I shopped at the retailer for moving supplies and home staging decor, as well as all of the extension cords and carbon monoxide alarms required in the new house. I’m a tried and true Target loyalist.
So, can I seriously give it all up, this core part of my identity and routine? The #11 Drive Up spot at Edina Super Target is my happy place. I shop at Target the way my middle-aged parent peers abuse Amazon Prime or Costco memberships. I live in Minneapolis, Minnesota, where Target’s corporate headquarters employs enough of my neighbors and casual acquaintances that I’ve been able to pretzel my cognitive dissonance about big box shopping into convincing myself that my weekly Target run is supporting the local economy, a close-but-not-quite equivalent to patronizing locally owned small businesses.
But I can’t keep clicking groceries, toys, books, mittens and sports bras into my cart, knowing that the corporation is walking in step with the craven and cruel policies of the new Trump Administration. Target’s employee memo cited “the importance of staying in step with the evolving external landscape.” They didn’t admit their capitulation, but I can read the context clues. They’re dropping their emphasis on diversity measures just when diverse people need mainstream support more than ever.
What does Target’s doing away with diversity efforts really help? Their bottom line? Not only do I not want to associate with the clientele I think Target is now trying to cultivate, but I can’t help but imagine some worst-case scenarios, many of which are already playing out. As trans people are having their identities erased by our government and cruel (and likely illegal) roundups of immigrants are taking place, how can I justify my continued use of the Circle App? Because it’s convenient?
Then again, it’s just groceries. And clothes. And Clinique SPF. I’m making this into a big deal because nothing else I’ve tried in the name of resistance has worked. I’ve voted, donated money to progressive causes and political campaigns, and volunteered for Get Out the Vote door knocks. I’ve even held fundraisers for Democratic politicians in my own backyard. And, for all of my efforts, nothing’s turned out the way I want. So, it’s time for me to hurt the diversity dumpers by denying them my domestic dollars.
Before I make my final decision, I check in with friends on social media. Lots of leftie folks I know are going to stop shopping at Target, too. My thread fills up with suggestions for alternative places to buy household goods: diversity-embracing Costco is a favorite, and so are all of the Twin Cities grocery chains that employ union workers. Lots of folks are going to shop small and local at businesses that do champion DEI (or at least aren’t actively disavowing it).
Maybe my $6,270.73 means nothing to Target CEO Brian Cornell and the rest of the company’s leadership team. But it buys an awful lot of household essential items for my family, the people I love most in this world, people who will lose out if more corporations buckle under Trump pressure. It may be a small thing, but many small actions can make a big impact. In this tenuous time, I’m determined to live my values, and if that means that I have to sacrifice my personal convenience and give up the chemical tang of those Market Pantry breadsticks, then I’ll do it.
So long, Bullseye.
Deborah Copperud is a freelance writer and podcaster in Minneapolis, Minnesota. Her work has appeared in Glamour, The Rumpus, Good Tape, Racket, and several literary journals. She co-hosts the “It’s My Screen Time Too” podcast, and she’s at work on an essay collection about volunteering. Follow her on Substack and send her your best frozen breadstick recommendations.
Do you have a compelling personal story you’d like to see published on HuffPost? Find out what we’re looking for here and send us a pitch at pitch@huffpost.com.
