Sam Walton

Sam Walton was born on March 29, 1918 in Kingfisher, Oklahoma. Shortly after he was born his family uprooted and moved to Missouri. Sam grew up in Missouri playing sports in high school and was a good student. He later attended the University of Missouri where he graduated with a degree in economics. After serving in World War 2, he opened his first business, a Ben Franklin franchise in Newport, Arkansas. Over a 20 year period he came to own 15 Ben Franklin stores with the help of his brother. Walton became frustrated with the management of the chain and decided to branch out on his own. In 1962, Walton opened the very first Wal-Mart.

In 1950, former J.C. Penny employee, Sam Walton opened Walton’s Five and Dime in Bentonville, Arkansas. By 1965, in the same small town Walton would open the first Walmart store unknowing that his investment would become the world’s largest retailer. By keeping sales prices low Walton was able to get ahead of the competition and successfully opened an additional store within the same year. Walton’s success continued and by 1967 his chain of stores had grown to 24 locations, and was bringing in about $12.6 million dollars in sales annually.

To fully understand Walmart’s business one should first study the history of Walmart’s retail company. Born in 1918, Sam Walton married his wife Helen Robson while serving in the military. After Sam’s military term ended Sam and Helen moved around until they finally settled in the small town of Bentonville, Arkansas. Bentonville is when Sam’s Walton’s 5&10 store led him to open the first Walmart in 1962 in Rogers, Arkansas (Founder of Walmart).

Sam Walton is an American business leader who is well known for founding Wal-Mart and Sam’s Club, which Wal-Mart has grown to be the world’s largest cooperation. Wal-Mart first opened in 1962 after years of retail management business. The first Wal-Mart was first opened in Rogers, Arkansas. Wal-Mart is the go-to store, a place that basically has everything. Wal-Mart carries all the necessary things people uses during their everyday life for reasonable prices. Sam Walton is a successful business leader because he started a successful business years ago that is still effective today.

Sam Walton, the founder of Wal-Mart, which is the biggest retailer in the world, had coined the famous saying ‘individuals don’t win, teams do’. There are several characteristics of Sam Walton that enabled him to be successful in his life and business dealings. Sam Walton could do anything he put his mind to. This can be witnessed in his ability to transform a small town store into a 25 billion-dollar industry at the time of his death. Also, Walton difficult childhood gave him something to strive towards later on in his life.

Wal-Mart was founded 52 years ago in Rogers, Arkansas by a man named Sam Walton. He wanted to start selling products at low prices to get higher sales. In 1945 he bought a branch, and with sales increasing to 45% within the first year, Walton’s store received $105,000, which is about $1.38 million in today’s market. Every year after that, sales were on a steady rise. In 1970, Wal-Mart had 38 stores, 1,500 employees, and sales of $44.2 million. Ten years later there were 1,000 more stores, and sales of $15.9 billion. Today their sales revenue has been $473 billion. They employ 2.2 million people worldwide, 800,000 of those employees are international

Through continual research and readings Team Wal-Mart has gained a better understanding and perspective of America’s fascination with Wal-Mart. Despite the constant barrage of negative press relating to its handling of labor issues, employee benefits, vendor practices and customer service, the retailer is able to thrive. Wal-Martfacts.com brings an enlightening perspective on Wal-Mart views and how they and the public perceive its pitfalls. First, we are going to examine the history of the company. Where did Sam Walton get the idea to come up with a retail store like Wal-Mart? Did he actually expect to be as large of the retailer as it is now? Our team wanted to better understand where Wal-Mart is with its corporate level strategy, business level strategy, strategic formulation and it own views on its implementation. W We will further explore some alternative solutions and make recommendations as to where the public views the company in regards to the topics of discussion, and where our team’s views, and its perceptions of where they are today in how well it is

4. Relations with Suppliers- Wal-Mart has in place a system that helps to achieve their goal of lower prices. This Information Technology system includes computers, networking, and internet that cuts inventories and waste and helps with speedy delivery. This system also helps Wal-Mart to keep in constant contact with suppliers by transferring the data that suppliers need so they know what Wal-Mart needs. Wal-Mart also works with suppliers to improve their production and squeezes the best prices out of its supplier. The video referred to Wal-Mart as the customer’s agent. All of this focus Wal-Mart puts on suppliers reduces costs and lowers prices. Wal-Mart’s technological/logistical leadership remains unmatched by competitors (Web, 2005).

Corporate structure was structured into three business units, Wal-Mart Stores USA, Sam’s Club, and Wal-Mart International. Wal-Mart is a public corporation, however the majority of the stock is still held by Walton family members. Therefore, there is lots of family involvement at the top level. The headquarters are in Bentonville, Arkansas, along with the control and decision making ability of the organization. There is a very hierarchical structure in place which only fuels the "good ' boys club" for top management. The other unique element in Wal-Mart's

In the late 1940s, a man named Sam Walton was franchising Ben Franklin’s store located in Newport, Arkansas. As a retailer, Walton continuously was in search of suppliers with best deals on merchandise. Usually, if a retailer was able to get a deal from a wholesaler they would leave their store prices at the regular price and pocket the excess money. Being the innovator he was, Walton decided to pass the savings on to the consumer and make his money through the increased volume of sales. This understanding would become the foundation of Walton’s business strategy when he developed Walmart in 1962.

In 1963, Sam Walton had a vision. A vision, that he could bring what the consumers needed, to them, at the lowest price possible. Mr. Walton believed that a company could not be run by just one person, it had to take team work. With Mr. Walton relying on his associates at the lowest level possible, he created the retail empire known today as Walmart. Mr. Sam, as he was referred to, would visit each and every store to learn about its culture. He would sit down with each and every associate and get ideas, comments, concerns, and anything that the associates wanted to talk to him about. This practice allowed for Walmart to create a culture of its own. A culture where each person makes a difference, no matter what your background or life style. The cultural synergy remains the same today. This philosophy is the basis for Walmart’s slogan, “Every person makes a difference.” Sam Walton knew that in order to be successful he needed to hear from everyone, to make everyone a spokesperson for the company. Many of the ideas that have been put into play have come from the lower level associates who never thought they could make a difference. Each associate comes from a different walk of life and background. This leads to the diverse workforce that Walmart has today. Sam’s practices have been instilled in today’s current CEO, Doug McMillion.

In this paper, I have researched to find out how this grant empire has become and remain so successful. I found out that one of the reasons is because it has been able to maintain the goals and standards that its owner, Mr. Sam Walton has built it upon. Even after his death, Wal-Mart continues to expand and grow in other countries. Wal-Mart is considered one of the top ten global companies today. Mr. Walton’s main goal was to sell products at a low price so that people could live a better life. Another reason is because Wal-Mart uses certain market mix strategies such as the four P”. These strategies, price, promotion, product and place.

Over the past decades, Wal-Mart has grown to become one of the largest retail stores in the world. They operate internationally and keep growing each passing year. They have developed some unique strategies that they have used allowing the company to grow into a multinational company. Various case studies and researches have sought to explain the success of this company over the years. Ken Mark from The University of Western Ontario conducted a case study on Wal-Mart and came up with some sound conclusions.

Wal-Mart was founded by businessman Sam Walton in 1962 as a small retail store in Arkansas, USA. From there it has grown to become the largest retail giant in the world. Ranked by Forbes 2000 list for 2011 as the 18th largest public corporation in the world, Wal-Mart is the highest revenue generating public entity in the world as of 31st January 2011, with gross revenue of 422 billion US Dollars (Walmart Annual Report, 2011). It is also noted for being the largest private employer in the world having just over 2 million employees serving in 8500 stores, in 15 different countries, under 55 different names, worldwide. (Daniel, 2010)

Sam Walton 's first venture as a milk boy is when he understood the value of a dollar and the knowledge of how far a dollar could take one in life. From Sam 's first five and dime stores in the 1950 's to his opening of the first Wal-Mart in Rogers, Arkansas in 1962, no one could have predicted the enormous success of this small-town merchant. Today, fourteen years after his death, Wal-Mart continues to grow and leadership of this company continues to rely on many of the traditional goals and philosophies that Mr. Walton left behind. In keeping one step