Target’s expansion into Canada failed very quickly. A lot of people think it is because Target wasn’t ready for its global expansion. But what is really wrong or what exactly “wasn’t ready”? Opening 124 stores within such a short period of time led to a big mass with inventory planning, disappointing shoppers expecting to see the same abundance they would see cross-border shopping in the United States. With bare shelves, Canadian shoppers couldn’t even shop if they wanted to.
Target Canada faced a choice: Adopt the US technology or implement something completely new. Adoption would have required customization for the Canadian dollar and French-language characters. Those changes would take time. Target was attempting something impossible: set up and run SAP in roughly two years – this doesn’t seem an impossibility – a challenge perhaps, but if you have the brightest resources on your project and you are deploying the best ERP application that money can buy.
When you have veteran employees on the payroll a greenfield implementation of SAP may be a great plan however when almost all your staff are fresh young graduates with little or minimal training and experience you need to have rock solid policies and procedures and need to have equally good consultants to help with the transition.
Target Canada hired the kinds of people that they felt that they wanted in terms of personalities, but junior staff received minimal training according to former employees who worked at Target in both countries.
Why Target Failed in Canada – Was the ERP System Rollout Part of the Problem?