The base hourly pay rate is set to hit $15 by end of 2020

MINNEAPOLIS — Target Corp. said Thursday that it is boosting its minimum hourly wage from $12 to $13, beginning in June.

Target has promised pay all its workers at least $15 an hour by the end of 2020. The company made that vow in 2017, when it raised its minimum hourly wage to $11. Last year Target bumped it up again, to $12. Target’s new chief human resources officer, Melissa Kremer, says the pay hikes have been paying off.

“Just a year and a half into this journey, we’re already seeing some promising examples,” Kremer noted on Target’s blog. “Take this past Holiday, when we set out to hire 120,000 seasonal team members to support our teams during the big shopping rush. We were able to start them all at $12 or more — and that helped us reach our seasonal hiring goal ahead of schedule, which gave our teams a lot of extra time to train and prepare for our busiest season of the year. It made a big difference, and our holiday results clearly show what an excellent job they did!”

Other retailers have been also raising their starting wages to attract talent. Amazon raised its base pay to $15 an hour last October, and Costco Wholesale Corp. in March raised its minimum hourly wage to that level. Last year Walmart raised its base hourly pay to $11, and more recently the company launched a bonus program for workers with good attendance.