Confessions of a Target electronics employee

Written by: Santiago Azpurua-Borras

The company with a bullseye for a logo whose customers often miss the point

When one spends seven hours at a time selling video games in a department store, one begins to notice certain trends among the consumers. As the electronics guy at a Target, Ive gotten to experience all of it first-hand.

Hit the jump to see what I’ve discovered.

On Fridays and Saturdays I have the pleasure of working in the electronics department of my local Super Target. (Its super because we have a super market inside, get it? Get it?)

Besides the usual haul of LCD TVs’, Blu-Ray players and watch batteries, I am often called upon to the video game cases, where I’ve been noticing some disturbing and bizarre consumer trends.

First thing is first. The Wii Fit may (it probably already has) change casual gaming forever. I’ve checked the store statistics and Wii Fit has been our best selling video game item for the last five months or so.

Soccer moms, older women and college students all seem to love the self-loathing that comes with the Wii Fit’s underhanded criticisms about your body.

During that time period when the Wii Fit was rare, I was once physically pushed over by some customers as they saw me stock what few Wii Fit’s we had left. Sheer insanity.

Staying with Nintendo a little bit, a lot of young girls seem to own Nintendo’s handheld, the DS Lite. They often buy the “Imagine” game series. You know the ones. Imagine Fashion designer, Imagine Ice Skater and out top-seller, Imagine Babyz. Babyz with a Z.

I have a theory about this and why female gamers are few and far between. As children they’re exposed to this crap, and thus once they’re older and able to make more difficult decisions for themselves, why would they turn to video games again?

Obviously there are plenty of exceptions.

I also once witnessed a little girl with legitimate interest in the Xbox 360, only to have her mother yank her away from the glass case saying “Get away from there, video games are for boys.” Awh.

I was completely shocked to think this kind of gender stereotypes still even exist.

I’ve also noticed a total lack of research on the side of the consumer. I was once asked for a video game, he didn’t know which console it was on but he did remember “… It had something to do with swords.”

Turns out he was looking for Grand Theft Auto IV.

Another major example of this is the fact by the sheer number of returns I get for Halo Wars.

As I’ve been consistently told, the only reason people bought Halo Wars is because they all assumed it was the sequel to Halo 3. Wha-?

Consumers also seem to judge game quality based on price. The higher the price, the better the game right? Which is probably why the $50 Mortal Kombat vs. DCU consistently outsells great deals like the $30 Oblivion Game of the Year Edition.

I am aware that these observations are just that, observations. But they are slowly turning into consumer trends, which is what disturbs me.

But as we say in the business : “May I help you find something?”