When Jen wanted to get a case for her new iPhone, the closest place to try to look for one was this one particular Target that was probably the only thing open on a Sunday evening. It’s not a Target we go to at all, really, but at the time of the decision, it was the closest thing available, and I kind of figured, it’s a Target; you kind of know what you’re getting when you go to one. However, this particular Target is kind of located in an area I’d like to classify as “urban,” or fuck it, ghetto, so it was going to be a conflict of which factor wins out – the ghettoness, or the clean and tidy branding of Target.
Well, the parking lot pretty much answered it from the get-go, because there was trash all over the place. Discarded fast food bags, Sprite bottles, cups from a variety of fast food dives; pretty much the norm found in any ghetto area. But that was just the outside, surely the inside of a Target would bring some normalcy back to the situation.
Upon entering, it’s a lot like any other Target at first glance. But it’s not until you slow down and actually look around does the reality begin to unfold. The carts are in disarray, from lackadaisical employees not doing their job of gathering and resetting the carts for customers. The baskets of chintzy dollar crap upon entering were in disarray and disheveled, even for that section.
The walls were eerily bare, devoid of all the posters of smiling families of all races and skin tones, doing very white things like having picnics, frolicking on the beach, or running through parks. In fact, the fluorescent lights closest to the walls were either burnt out or deliberately turned off, leading to a spooky dimness within the typical bright sterility of Target stores.
If what is presented at the endcaps of shelves and racks is what is fairly indicative of what the local clientele, this Target must serve a lot of wild animals, Tarzan and his family, or a lot of black women, because walking past the womens’ section revealed a generous amount of leopard-spotted or tiger-striped apparel, from shirts, pants, to tights.
Often times I like to peruse through the men’s section’s clearance racks, because occasionally there are some gems in the rough that I like to pick up for cheap. But it would’ve been nice if this particular Target had a men’s section; relatively. Seriously, it was about one-quarter the size of a men’s section found at any other Target store, and this particular one literally had no dress clothing or business casual apparel; just athletic gear, jeans and t-shirts. And it segued so nicely into the pets and animals section.
It turned out that the electronics section was in the west-most part of the store, like they sometimes are, but I’m typically used to the electronics section being towards the back of most Target stores, and if I had to guess, I’d assume back first. Pictured above is what the back part of this particular Target looked like. Based on the location and what I’d already seen, if you were to tell me that every single electronic item were stolen, I’d probably believe you. Unfortunately, it turns out that this particular Target’s electronic section was indeed on the west wall of the store, thus killing what I’d have hoped would have been a brilliant dark joke.
Although both Jen and I got some things we wanted to get, it kind of goes without saying that this is probably the worst Target store in the Metro Atlanta area, and there’s little merit to going there again, if it can be helped. The store had subtle hints of disorganization, messes, and carts all over the place. It’s really filthy on the outside, and compared to other Target stores, a pigsty on the inside.
But I guess you can’t really expect much out of the Target in the ghetto.
