Target Fires 550 at Corporate

Following its withdrawal from the Canadian market, retailer Target Corp. is laying off 550 employees at its Minneapolis corporate offices.

Of those 550 employees, about 350 local positions are being eliminated immediately, according to published reports. Most of the remaining employees “are needed through the closure of the Target Canada stores and their positions will be eliminated following the liquidation period,” Target said in a statement.

New CEO Brian Cornell has been reviewing all of Target’s operations. In January, Cornell announced the closing of all 133 Target stores in Canada, less than two years after the retailer began its expansion there. The pullout brought nearly 18,000 job cuts and a $5 billion write-down, apparently now being felt at corporate headquarters.

Target spokeswoman Katie Boylan said the layoffs “impacted teams across the organization," according to published reports. The affected jobs were headquarters-based positions in Minnesota or India; the company expects 170 positions at its technology operations in India to be eliminated over time.

These layoffs are the latest chapter in a rocky couple of years for Target, which cleaned its corporate house after a well-publicized data breach in 2013.

 

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