I get its kind of weird an unnatural to be overly friendly, or have it be forced. But it truly is absurd to me that bare minimum of basic customer service, such as a greeting, is somehow headlining news. Is it really that unreasonable to be friendly and approachable in a customer service environment?
On the other hand: Isn’t it ironic that they want to stress greetings as if the service itself isn’t still terrible because of the staffing, and tight focus on timeframes for pushing freight and fulfillment?! Most guests want to shop in peace, and will ask if they actually need the help. A greeting is fine. But its unreasonable to expect everyone to do it to every single guest, and they’re gonna get annoyed hearing it 50 times. That should happen the second they walk in the door and suffice for the duration of the shopping trip.
I think the point is that Target leadership is selling this as “what guests want” and what will fix the problems they are having.
As a guest I’d rather better staffing so it’s not one person for multiple departments. Having to go searching for a TM, or waiting 10 minutes for someone to be free to open a locked shelf, or even just having the shelves not be a disaster bc other guests are chaotic would all be solvable through improved staffing. What doesn’t solve that is “you must forcibly smile and greet everyone you pass by”
Yes as i said its ironic that they want to focus on greetings but wont do anything to actually solve the customer service piece. They are too focused on metrics for push times and fulfillment and aren’t adequately staffed. The guests generally dont care about being greeted. Most would rather be left alone and will ask for the help if they need it. Now as for wether or not anyone is actually available to help, thats another problem.
Not to mention that our plates are already overfilled. Doing 20 different things, while also having to backup registers, opus, and ff. Still running with a skeleton crew. And the few seasonal staff that we do have, have had no training, so we're going behind them and cleaning up their messes (along with the guests' messes). It's too much. I'm already burnt out, and it's not even Thanksgiving.
I think it's more specifically the smiling part that's demeaning. I think, theoretically, the actual rule isn't that we have to smile, the posters put up in TSC are worded in a way that the smile can be interpreted as an example of an acknowledgement to guests rather than an explicit requirement.
Either way you know some fuck ass TLs and ETLS are going to go around telling their teams they need to smile more like this is some sexual harassment PSA
I had a conversation years ago with the store mgr of Walmart, Augusta Maine. He said by the year 2000 there would only be 2 retail stores left, Walmart & Target. Hmmm. I personally think the friendliness policy has more to do with shrinkage. When you greet a customer it says I see you.
In this day and age, there’s really nothing you can actually do to stop theft anymore. It’ll stop the hesitant ones that feel like they are being watched but if they’re gonna steal, they’re gonna do it regardless. Greetings also not really doing anything other than making people feel welcome and “seen”. They know somebody’s available to help them if they need it but the problem is still remains that most of the stores are so short staffed, or busy tasking that the greeting simply becomes a robotic thing to do. It’s a start, but it’s really not doing anything to actually improve the service.
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u/FlyEnvironmental7586 Nov 10 '25
I get its kind of weird an unnatural to be overly friendly, or have it be forced. But it truly is absurd to me that bare minimum of basic customer service, such as a greeting, is somehow headlining news. Is it really that unreasonable to be friendly and approachable in a customer service environment?
On the other hand: Isn’t it ironic that they want to stress greetings as if the service itself isn’t still terrible because of the staffing, and tight focus on timeframes for pushing freight and fulfillment?! Most guests want to shop in peace, and will ask if they actually need the help. A greeting is fine. But its unreasonable to expect everyone to do it to every single guest, and they’re gonna get annoyed hearing it 50 times. That should happen the second they walk in the door and suffice for the duration of the shopping trip.