The whole lay-by issue is a sideshow. Russo is employing the same play book he did at Kmart. This time it has an even better chance of working because he now controls both Kmart and Target. His methods of using of flat pricing (EDLP) at Kmart has won trust with customers who just used to wait for things to go on sale (previous hi-lo strategy).

It works particularly well in clothing, he cuts the price, lifts the volume and then secures better terms with Chinese etc factories. He then lowers the price again which drives volumes further. The drop in sales is simply a rebasing of the business to set it up for growth. Also, Kmart for the same period posted 8% same store sales growth, so he got some of the lost Target sales back there.

Big W is really struggling, there is some chance that it becomes loss making as Target eventually gets turned around and Kmart powers on. It is rudderless and likely will be sold off by Woolworths.