Target, Dwell And Why Everyone Is Doubling Down On Decor

Designer partnerships are not exactly new territory for Target. An April 2015 pair-up with fashion icon Lilly Pulitzer was such a runaway success that the event — which was supposed to go on for a few weeks — was more or less entirely sold out within a few days (and for some high-demand items, sellouts were more easily measured in hours). A later pair-up with the Finnish high fashion Marimekko line was not quite as insanely off the hook. Most reports indicated it didn’t quite have the frenzied startup that the Lilly Pulitzer event did, but it certainly and solidly sold out.

“We don’t intend for these to sell out in a day,” a Target spokesman noted.

Not all the pair-ups work out. A holiday season collaboration between high-end department store Neiman Marcus and Target flopped pretty spectacularly a few years ago. But they are all part and parcel to the magic of the Target — or Tarjay — brand. Consumers know Target is a big store, of course, but for years, Target was the big-box store with just a bit more glamour and sparkle, and the Tarjay ideal made a nice contrast with the more mercenary price focus over at its big blue rival at Walmart.

The Great Recession — and the subsequent tightening of the national belt — pushed Target away from that branding, as low prices became the order of the day for a wide swath of the American consuming public. Saving money suddenly got very “in” as the upper-middle class and middle class discovered en masse the wonders of shopping at a dollar store.

But the recovery — however tenuous and controversial it is (particularly in an election year) — is undeniably underway, and Target has spent much of this year trying hard to get back to its Tarjay roots — a goal CEO Brian Cornell has been pretty open about in interviews.

“I think, over the last 15 months, the team, particularly our product development design group, has made some big strides in getting that back. I think it starts with understanding trends, really taking the time to understand the consumer. That is something we’ve clearly recommitted to, making sure we’re bringing that quality and innovation to those style categories — apparel, home and beauty — so that we elevate that ‘Tarjay’ experience.”

And in light of the efforts to bring the Tarjay sexy back, the recent announcement of Target’s newest collaboration with Dwell magazine is a natural step forward.

More interestingly, perhaps, however, is where Target is pushing — specifically into home decor and furnishing — since it is ground that has suddenly gotten very popular with a new set of retailers.

High-End Modern Design, Middle-Class Pricing

Dwell — for those outside its small but incredibly loyal following — is a design and lifestyle brand focused on hip design trends for millennial shoppers. If one happens to be a shopper under 40 with dreams of living in the nicest imaginable 120-square-foot space, fully understanding the Knoll Bertoia Diamond Chair or experiencing backyard triumph through the use of succulents and native grasses, Dwell is probably the best place on the web to hang out (outside of Pinterest, of course).

Dwell’s design advice is sound — and the photographs are stunning — but it does tend toward the niche reader, since, statistically speaking, very few people actually need information about designing a perfect forest refuge for autistic triplets and their caregiver. Its partnership with Target, therefore, offers it as much an opportunity to tap a more mainstream audience, while it gives Target a chance to reach a more design-oriented shopper.

Their joint collaboration, Modern by Dwell, is represented by a collection of 120 household items, including furniture (indoor and outdoor), decor, tabletop settings and accessories.

“We’ve long admired Target for how they embrace good design and cultivate unique partnerships, so we’re thrilled to work together on introducing this new collection,” said Chris Deam and Nick Dine, co-creative directors of product design at Dwell.

As one might expect, the focus is on high style and reasonable pricing, with furniture ranging from $49.99–$399.99 and $16.99–$99.99 for decor, tabletop and accessory products.

“With our friends at Dwell magazine, we’ve created a line that captures modernism beautifully. The collection is a great complement to our current assortment — it’s stylish, high quality and the prices are great,” noted Mark Tritton, executive VP and chief merchandising officer at Target.

Moreover, Dine noted, the new high-end line gives Target a natural chance to do something that is always its goal — respond to a customer demand.

“Many of our guests have told us they want to add a modern aesthetic into their environment, but they want it to be easy and, just as important, affordable,” Tritton affirmed.

And Target, it seems, is not the only retailer whose customer base has recently discovered a passion for decorating.

Home Decor Is Suddenly Quite Hot

A little under a week after Target announced its high-design push into home furnishings, eBay made a similar announcement. Its new platform called eBay Collective.

EBay Collective is dedicated to furniture and other home wares and is theoretically designed to appeal to a high-end crowd looking for unique items, antiques, contemporary design, fine art and more.

The site launches with 21 dealers on board who were specifically invited to participate by eBay. Listings include things like a rare Andy Warhol signed screenprint, a pair of Gio Ponti armchairs (Italy, c. 1964) and a Mies van der Rohe chaise lounge in original leather (c. 1980), for example. The company is also syndicating content from Architectural Digest and ArchDigest.com to further fill the site with information about decorating, shopping and other industry events.

But though its pitch is to the high-end consumer, the site is powered by visual search engine Corrigon, which eBay acquired for under $30 million earlier this year. Corrigon offers a “Shop the Room” feature, wherein online shoppers hover over an image of a fully designed space and then search across the eBay inventory to surface items that are close matches to that portion of the image. That full inventory search means users can still compare similar-looking items across a variety of price points, meaning the site can also appeal to people with high-end tastes and thrifty buying habits.

And it is at least notable that bigger and better-known retail players are pushing harder and harder into home decor and decoration — and at the higher end.

So, what trend are they all watching and perhaps trying to get ahead of?

A new report from Zillow on who exactly bought all the new houses last year might offer some important clues.

The report noted that the demographics of who is buying houses in the U.S. market is starting to shift, particularly among first-time buyers. Those slow-to-the-real-estate-gate millennials are starting to show up at closings in greater and greater numbers. According to the Zillow report, nearly half of sales in the past year (47 percent) went to people who were buying their first home. That’s much higher than the 33 or so percent that many analysts had predicted for 2016.

More interesting than that, the data also indicated the trend was mostly pushed by a wave of couples in their 30s, who are the most common first-time buyers. And they are buying fairly large homes. The data indicates that those in the new home buyer wave spend just as much as baby boomers on a home that is only slightly smaller than homes purchased by repeat buyers.

So, why are retailers selling furniture?

Because the data indicates that a very large cohort of people who have stayed in small apartment rentals for a longer-than-average amount of time are moving en masse to 2,000-square-foot homes.

And someone has to sell them the furniture. If recent headlines are any indication, the race is on to see who it will be.