Welcome back to The Flyover, your daily digest of important, overlooked, and/or interesting Minnesota news stories.
Report: Everything’s Wrong With Target
It’s no secret that Minneapolis-based Target Corp. is struggling these days. Sales fell 2.8% in the first quarter this year, and by mid-July Target stock had nosedived 60% since its all-time peak in 2021.
So what’s going wrong? A lot of things, as detailed very thoroughly in this Twin Cities Business Journal deep dive from Erik Tormoen. That includes boycotts over dropping DEI measures, outrage over Pride month merch, further outrage over toning down Pride month merch, and trying (and failing) to compete with Cub or Walmart’s grocery sales. (One win: Its in-house Good & Gather brand is now a multi-billion-dollar operation.) Another criticism? That the big-box shop has gone too basic.
“I don’t think you get anywhere by trying to please the most people,” Anne Mezzenga, a former Target marketing exec, tells Tormoen. “Once [the creative side] started to lose priority, you’re just running a business. You’re in direct competition with an organization like Walmart and Amazon. You’ll never beat them.”
The people working at Target don’t seem to have much confidence in the future either.
“In early June, a companywide survey showed that roughly half of Target’s employees didn’t think the company was making the changes necessary to compete effectively,” Sarah Nassauer writes for the Wall Street Journal. “About 40% of the roughly 260,000 staffers who replied said they didn’t have confidence in the company’s future. The scores—which declined from a year ago—were even lower for those staffers at Target’s headquarters in Minneapolis.”
Big changes are ahead, as CEO Brian Cornell is expected to announce his retirement soon. WSJ reports that a recent survey found that 96% of investors wanted the company to look at external candidates while Target seems to be focusing on in-house.
My theory? This is all fallout from unceremoniously dropping its mascot in 2024. Justice for Bullseye!
Strib Launches High School Sports Mega-Project Strib Varsity
Have you been to the Minnesota Star Tribune’s website today? If you have, you’ve probably been treated to multiple popups and a few (not-quite) “breaking news” stories announcing Strib Varsity, a new franchise aimed at covering local high school sports at a completionist level. (Also, yes, they are calling it a “franchise.” I am not sure why.)
“The value proposition I'm most excited about is to make sure every high school athlete in MN finds their name on our platform,” Strib CEO/Publisher Steve Grove writes via Twitter. (Which "value proposition" are you most excited about?) Meanwhile, former KARE 11 sports anchor Randy Shaver announced he was joining the SV team via a kinda odd hostage-themed selfie series.
So what is Strib Varsity? For starters, every single high school in Minnesota that competes in MSHSL varsity sports now has its own homepage. That’s… nearly 500 pages with 32 hub tabs offering a broader regional focus. They'll also be livestreaming games and other content (there’s already a YouTube channel), posting content on TikTok and other socials, and sending out a newsletter on the regular.
This all seems like a smart move! As newsroom staffs have dwindled, high school sports has become a woefully undercovered beat. And certainly spotlighting teens is a great way to get at sports parents eager to subscribe and log in daily.
But, as someone who has managed a lot of data systems over the years, including medical, business, and public-facing ones like the City Pages calendar, looking at this beast gives me pause. These things take a lot of time, money, know-how, and employees to keep running. It looks like the Strib is putting all of those things into Strib Varsity (new hires for this thing are reportedly in the “double digits”), so hopefully the newspaper can maintain and deliver on these ambitious promises.
Alleged Murderer Vance Boelter Tells His Stupid Story
Look, when someone (allegedly) goes on a killing spree they’re probably going to tell you a whole lot of bullshit when you asked them why they did it. Case in point: An interview with alleged killer Vance Boelter posted this morning on TheBlaze, Glenn Beck’s conservative crackpot website. This story is so dumb, I’m not even going to link to it. Instead, I’m going to do readers a solid and sum it up.
According to Boelter, he was never planning on shooting state Sen. John Hoffman and his wife, Yvette, this past June. In true serial killer “look what you made me do” fashion, he says he was simply planning to make a citizen's arrest, but panicked and instead announced “This is a robbery!” and began shooting when the couple tried to push him out of their home. Why did he then drive to Brooklyn Park, where he would (allegedly) murder state Rep. Melissa Hortman, her husband Mark, and their dog Gilbert, while shooting at police officers who arrived at the scene? That goes unexplained. (Boelter tells the publication he can’t comment on that aspect of his morning, as he’s currently awaiting trial with a not guilty plea in place.)
Then TheBlaze’s story devolves into a Covid-19 truther nonsense, as Boelter, a man with no background in science, says he went deep undercover in the funeral industry to prove that vaccines are the real killer.
Have I wasted enough of your time? Let’s move on.
Minnesota Restroom Nominated for Award
Speaking of toilets, uniform corporation Cintas announced the nine finalists for its 24th annual America’s Best Restroom Contest, and the restroom/shower building at Ely, Minnesota's Bear Head Lake State Park made the cut.
“This restroom is proof that practicality and natural beauty can go hand in hand,” the Cintas team writes, noting that the facilities meets all ADA guidelines and the dishwashing sinks outside are a nice touch.
Our humble park is up against some stiff competition. Bear Head’s concrete walls lack the opulence of Salt Lake City’s Little America Hotel or the stark modernity of NYC’s Rooftop at Pier 17. However! Racket’s Jay Boller may have visited these restrooms, and… oops, he doesn’t remember them.
"Most state park toilets are glorified pits, disgusting and smelly; I'm always charmed by the passive aggressive signs that warn you not to drop things down because they're VERY DIFFICULT TO RETRIEVE," he muses. "I don't distinctly remember visiting the Bear Head Lake facilities, though I've been to the park. Based on photos, they really do seem to sparkle. Springing for those marble finishes? Worth it."
The winner receives a Cintas deep-cleaning service and $2,500 in supplies. Past local winners have included the Varsity Theater and the Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport. You can vote for Bear Head Lake’s pearly shitters online through August 15.
