Target transfers photo department to EZ Prints

Another major North American retailer is transferring it branded photo printing site to a traditional photo site. Target Photo has elected to transfer its business to a partner, EZ Prints. In an announcement posted on the site, Target says users can migrate their account to the EZ Prints site.

This is the second major announcement of a large retailer doing this, as Costco picked Shutterfly to fulfill its online photo services. While on the surface very similar, the two actions were different in practice. In Target’s case, the retailer had been slowly exiting the category for years, with the removal of its once-prominent photo kiosk departments, over the course of a few years.

And one could hardly argue Target had the visibility and the energy in the category that Costco had. Also, Target’s existing customers will experience very little disruption, as the EZ Prints platform is the same as the Target Photo platform they enjoyed for 15 years.

In the case of Costco, this was a bigger blow to the visibility of the category, as for many years, Costco and it’s once-dominant in-store labs, were considered an industry trendsetters.