For over a decade, it was Brian and Doug. Now it’s Mike and John in one of retail’s premier heavyweight fights.
Both Walmart Inc. and Target Corp. have new chief executive officers coming in this year, both internal promotions of company veterans.
John Furner is taking the reins from Doug McMillon at Walmart, while Michael Fiddelke is stepping in for Brian Cornell at Target.
While both companies are huge, Walmart definitely wins on scale with annual revenues of $700 billion while Target is hovering just above $100 billion.
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Walmart — which competitively is now more focused on Amazon than on Target — has been successfully branching out, moving into higher-end fashions with its third-party marketplace online and sharpening its presentation and offerings in-store.
That has the retailer nudging into Target’s traditional high-style, low-cost territory.
But where Walmart is on top and looking to press its advantage, Target is just now coming off its back foot after a few years of uneven performance and doubling down on what it’s best known for.
“Style and design are at the heart of how we’re deepening connection with guests and writing Target’s next chapter of growth,” Fiddelke told WWD in a statement last month.
Target is both moving quicker and trying some new things.
It transformed what was a more traditional grab-and-go store in New York’s SoHo shopping district into a style concept store that puts the retailer’s fashions in a whole different context. The company also has a new Manhattan headquarters, designed to keep it plugged into the city’s creative sectors and keep Target at the cultural forefront.
Fiddelke has moved quickly since securing the top job to put his mark on the company and change its trajectory.
Investors, especially those who wanted a more dramatic shift and grumbled over an insider getting the top job, are watching closely.
But Furner and Fiddelke are dealing with much more than their companies’ pasts.
Both are taking the reins at a time when AI promises to change everything in retail, again, and they’ll have to steer their mammoth brick-and-mortar chains into that ever-more technology infused future.
