As a retail giant, Target's business is heavily impacted by the health of the consumer, which has started to wane recently. In its third-quarter earnings report, Target's CEO Brian Cornell said that at the end of the quarter, "sales and profit trends softened meaningfully, with guests' shopping behavior increasingly impacted by inflation, rising interest rates and economic uncertainty." Now, due to the slowdown in its business, Target was left with the wrong kind of excess inventory on its shelves as consumers shifted their spending habits away from discretionary items.