Wal-Mart takes over the world...

[Phlegm]

one country at a time. From Forbes:

NEW YORK - What operates in 44 countries, has 2,276 stores outside of the U.S., has more than 100,000 associates (their term for worker) in Mexico alone and does $56.3 billion in sales overseas? That $56.3 billion figure nearly matches the size of the U.S. sales of the Kroger Co., and they are the seventh-largest retail company in the world.

It is, of course, Wal-Mart. And now the accounting for 2005 is in — it increased its international 2005 business by 18.3 percent over 2004 and grew its international operating profits to nearly $3 billion.

John Menzer, until very recently the president of the international division and now head of U.S. store operations, explains the reason why. "Country by country, the world is discovering the great value of shopping at Wal-Mart. We need to be the growth of Wal-Mart when some day the United States slows down."

Menzer led the multistore acquisition of Asda of the U.K., and of Seiyu in Japan. These acquisitions have become the model for how Wal-Mart's roll out in new countries will be accomplished. Go into a country, pick a sizable retailer, take a piece, and then take the whole piece, then change the name, and voilà: a multitude of Wal-Mart stores with discounting in place, new technology behind it and an awesome scale of retailing and supply chain systems.

Wal-Mart is growing so fast by accelerating electronic sales — taking Apple Computer iPods, Hewlett-Packard printers and Toshiba laptops around the world. They'll grow by pushing their supermarket arena products. They'll grow as they set up in nation after nation.

Above all, they'll grow a store at a time. Already, they have retail stores operating in Mexico (774 units), Puerto Rico (54 units), Canada (263 units), Argentina (11 units), Brazil (295 units), China (56 units), Germany (88 units), South Korea (16 units), United Kingdom (315 units), Costa Rica (124 units), El Salvador (57 units), Guatemala (120 units), Honduras (32 units) and Nicaragua (30 units). During 2005, Wal-Mart started its move into India.

They are not only building stores in these countries, they are building their own distribution centers that are the logistics hubs where they receive, sort and stock the Wal-Mart stores in their area. These distribution centers can be ten times larger than their stores.

So the commitment within these countries is more than providing stores. It is a full supply chain system and all the logistics that can go into it. They can have a hundred or more docking stations in one distribution center. China, for instance, with its 56 stores, has several distribution centers such as the one at Shechen. These centers, like their stores, have local associates, and in China, they number in the tens of thousands.

But to keep a balanced view, there is a downside, too.

“Germany has been terrible for Wal-Mart," says Jon Jacobs, retail analyst for Cantor Fitzgerald. "They are taking losses in a soft economy. Their operations in the U.K, that are around 50 percent of their overseas business, have shown uneven results, halted growth and [caused] financial disappointment in a market that has taken a consumer tailspin. This would make it understandable that they would move forward in Japan and both Latin America and Central America where they have recently made many gains.”

Most important, Wal-Mart is exporting a retailing and supply chain system that not only trains and influences the "associates" but the public as well. People in these many countries become Wal-Mart customers. They will live with the results of Wal-Mart's (and P&G's) commitment to radio frequency identification (RFID). The technology sneaks into the store on cat’s feet.

The power of Wal-Mart is partly derived from its partnerships and its bold use of technology. These two things in combination give them the muscle to knock out much of the competition, for better or worse, regardless of state or nation. Retail Forward, Inc. has predicted that Wal-Mart will top $500 billion by 2010. That will translate into more power and more countries.

The question is, What is this going to change, and how will the world and its customers adapt themselves to a Wal-Mart world?

Goodbye mom-and-pop stores, goodbye local stores in local places. Hello to stores that have a favored position in their procurement processes and their overall supply chain practice. Hello to efficient store-owned distribution centers. Hello to mega-stores with discount price advantages and a new sense of providing for shoppers' full-life experiences. Hello to radio frequency identification (RFID) and all its speed, accuracy and increased visibility of product availability.

[brinstar]

won't catch me there!

[Captain Insano]

yah me neither. It's not so much that I hate walmart, even though I do, but the shopping experience there is awful.

Walmarts are always packed, crowded, loud and they sell nothing but crap. Not to mention they are overrun with white trash and fat military wives. Makes me want to molotov cocktail the entire place to the foundation.

[Minrott]

I wish I had a choice anymore. Now it's the only grocery store within 30 miles. I still refuse to buy hardware, household stuff, auto stuff or what not as long as those other stores are here.

[Sorina S]

Ahh Walmart, the larget private employer in the US. The largest importer of Chinese products in the US. If ya haven't seen it, watch this:

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline ... mart/view/

Personally I don't think Walmart is doing anything that isn't good...for Walmart.

[Ouchyfish]

It wouldn't be so bad if they would curb their profit by buying American every single time it was possible. Imagine what that company could do for this country if they only would do that. =(

The only solution is to force all companies making goods being imported to pay their workers the American minimum wage. Although I have heard they have found a way around that as well. Watch the movie "The High Cost of Low Prices" for a good show.

(Note the "documentary" is filled with some innaccuracies, such as insinuating the mom+pop old man lost his lifelong hardware shop because of Wal-Mart coming to his town, despite his store deciding to close and closing before they even made the decision to go there. =)

[Kramer]

wal mart is a shocking thing, it seems that every year that old Sam Walton is dead, the sweet old face of the global superstore becomes uglier


i just don't go there because the majority of their stuff is crap... and the stores are always packed....

i went there on a Saturday night, around 7 pm, like 7 years ago, and it was packed with people, whole families out in the store... TO SHOP AT WALMART!

[Ouchyfish]

In Austin, TX you need a fucking passport to shop at the Wal-Mart on Teri Road. Wall-to-wall spics and utter dregs of humanity.

Target is so awesome and I really miss shopping there for much better quality shit. Their only drawback being their variety, or lack thereof, sucks the fat cock.


Edit: Got my roads mixed up.

[Skrum]

I buy stuff like toilet paper at walmart and I buy my clothing at target.

[Project DARC]

(Note the "documentary" is filled with some innaccuracies, such as insinuating the mom+pop old man lost his lifelong hardware shop because of Wal-Mart coming to his town, despite his store deciding to close and closing before they even made the decision to go there. =)

If im thinking of the right thing, that documentary was actually based in the town i live in, Middlefield Ohio. Though that hardware store was never extremely successful, it was a coffin nail. It is crazy to witness how much a store like walmart can impact a small town.

we recently had a stabbing in the walmart parking lot. that's virtually unheard in this town.

Its also crazy watching the Amish go apeshit over the cheap dvd bin.

[The Kizzy]

Was it an Amish man? Does your walmart have parking spaces for the horse abd buggies?

[Project DARC]

the guy who got stabbed? no, it was a business owner from Troy. you can find reference to it on http://www.burtonblog.com as well as a the paindealer and news herald sites.

There are buggy tie ups, way at the other end of the parking lot Walmart's not catered to the amish in middlefield, its catered to the total redneck population surrounding it. I watched a kid climb the top of his father's econoline van (complete with gaudy horse artwork) while his dad played with a remote control truck in the middle of a packed wal-mart parkinglot. the father of the kid would race the remote control truck after cars moving around in the parking lot while the kid whooped and hollered. Made my day when he fell off the van when he was climbing down.

[Minrott]

heh they tie up to the light posts here. You can always tell when they've been around, there's a big pile of horse shit by the posts.

[Captain Insano]

I would beat and amish down if I saw him driving off leaving his horse shit all over the fucking place.

Man I hate Walmart's. There are more rednecks and white trash at those places than at a nascar race.

[Sorina S]

Personally I don't have a problem with Walmart. They exemplify the zero sum mentality of capitalist society. Big fish in an ever increasing smaller pond. That is the promise of capitalism, eventually you will control everything.

If they didn't do it someone would have, Target, Kmart, WhathaveUmart...There's a reason we as a country screw ourselves in the name of freedom. What we never realised was that wealth does not equal that. And so we give our wealth away.

I may be a bit of an isolationist, and in this brave new world of global economy, well maybe I'm a bit backwards. Then again, we are the only ones I see in the world that so readily give it away.

You remeber the 'Buy American' campaign of the 80s? You'd be hard pressed and have to give up alot of creature comfort to wage such a war now.

On the other hand, there's no way Americans are gonna pay more for their goods just to satisfy the patriotic. The beat goes on. When someone makin a livin wage at Thompson, a job for life, is suddenly faced with unemployment or underemployment because an American company puts them under. Well that just gets under my skin.(used the word 'under' too many times I know but I'm in a hurry)

And if you think any of you are safe, well, think again.

[brinstar]

heh i got pretty good job security, i work in criminal justice

[Harrison]

I shop at Walmart to piss off hippies.

[Lyion]

heh i got pretty good job security, i work in criminal justice

They just cut the staff for our local police force.

[Minrott]

Yeah. My girlfriend works for the State Patrol and I have numerous friends that work in the Prison system. I wouldn't consider any of their jobs terribly secure anymore, the way our state pisses away money. We just went through a huge round of cutbacks, lots of people lost their jobs.

[Ouchyfish]

No wonder we keep hearing about fuckers escaping the jails every day.


We need about 20 new prisons and have them staffed with Terminator-like robots.

Either that or sentence people to be on a "Running Man" type of show.