Dayton Company Case

In 1902 George Dayton founded the Goodfellow Dry Goods Company which is now known as Target. Dayton opened the Goodfellow store in Minneapolis when he found that Minneapolis had the strongest market in the Midwest. He took sole ownership and became the first president of Goodfellow Dry Goods Company. As the company quickly grew Dayton renamed the company to The Dayton Company which was more commonly known as Dayton's Department store. In 1946 the Dayton Company started giving back to the community by giving back five percent of pretax profits. In 1953 the company then expanded their products. They opened a commercial interior department which sold furniture, fabrics and decorations to commercial stores. It is now known as Target Commercial Interiors. The company then had their first branch in 1954 outside downtown Minneapolis to Rochester, Minnesota. Then in 1956 Dayton's expanded to the suburbs of Minneapolis. The store was located in the nation's first fully enclosed shopping center. In 1960 Dayton's looked for a way to strengthen their company. They came up with discount merchandising. By taking this risk they went from being a family- run department store to the nation's largest department store. In 1962 target came up with a new icon. Dayton's director of publicity Stewart K. Widdess came up with the name target. The colors red and white inspired him for the name and the classic bull's-eye logo. In 1967 Dayton's official became a national retailer. The company went public on September 6th 1967. In 1968 the company expands to more cities like St. Louis, Houston and Dallas. Since the company expanded so much they decided they needed to revamp the logo to something more memorable and direct. In 1969 Dayton's merged with J.L. Hudson Company. They then adopted the name Dayton-Hudson Corporation. Also in 1969 the company opened a distribution center in Fridley, Minnesota. In 1975 the company reached a milestone. Target became the number one revenue producer. In 1978 Dayton's- Hudson corporation purchased Mervyn's California to expand the company even more. In 1979 target reached yet another milestone. They celebrated reaching $1 billion in annual sales by holding their first billion dollar sale for guests. Then in 1983 Target went to the west and opened stores in southern California and in 1988 they went to the northern pacific and opened more stores. Target then moved to the southeast on April 30th, 1989. Stores open in Kentucky, Tennessee, George and Florida. By opening stores in the southeast target now have stores from coast-to-coast. In 1990 Dayton's- Hudson purchases yet another company, they purchases a department store called Marshall Field's, by purchasing this company Target scale and size increases dramatically. On September 30th, 1990 in Apple Valley, Minnesota target opened a target that was 50 percent larger store. The store included wider aisles, faster checkout