Walmart Community Observation Examples

Some may claim a Walmarts’ arrival in a community is helpful to improve the growth and development in the community, but others tell a different story. Many claim that a Walmart is great way to create new jobs in the community. They are partially right, between construction and development, plenty of jobs are created. Also, about 300 retail jobs are created based on the amount needed to run a Walmart super center twenty fours a day, seven days a week. However, Kenneth Stone, a professor of economics at Iowa State University, conducted a study in which two Super Walmart centers in two different states were evaluated. The study lasted about two years and showed that for every one job Walmart had created, 1.4 jobs were lost in local communities (Davidson 1). Walmarts’ low prices come with additional costs that we are

6) Are Wal-Mart’s persuasive tactics concerning its value to communities ethical in approach and intention?

The things a person could see if they simply watched Walmart’s customers for even a short amount of time are mind boggling. During a typical, mundane Monday afternoon, I browsed through Walmart 's many aisles not in search of a particular product, but simply observing and studying different aspects of the supermarket. The customer’s behavior, product placement, and employee interactions all stood out to me as interesting. I also took notice of how different consumers interacted with different staff members and vice-versa. As I observed the customers, teachings from my Sociology class immediately started taking form in the real world. While analyzing the different social interactions the people of Walmart were having, I begin to apply different theories, such as the functionalist theory, why these things must happen, the conflict theory, why they are unequal, and symbolic interaction, how they happen. Surprisingly, while watching the average day in Walmart, I found it was hard to ignore my ethnocentric viewpoint, thinking your culture is better than another, to cloud my perspective of why certain interactions were occurring.

Wal-Mart founded in 1962 by Sam Walton is now the largest American retail corporation. With thousands of chains of stores and warehouses Wal-Mart monopolized the American retail industry. In addition, Wal-Mart is the second largest retail corporation in the world employing of two million employees world-wide. As one of the most valuable corporations in the world Wal-Mart continues to improve their sales annually while offering some of the lowest prices available. Wal-Mart’s famous low price guarantee, come at a high expense of the environment, the small businesses, education, the rights and safety of the consumer, but most importantly their employees. Although Wal-Mart has plays a dominate role in American economy, this “American”

On July 2, 1962 Sam Walton opened the very first Walmart store in Rogers, Ark. Each week, more than 140 million Americans shop at Walmart. The company has over 11,000 stores in 28 countries. In fact, just recently the company opened a new store in my neighborhood. All summer I watched them build and build and I would say to my mom, “I can’t wait for them to finish so we can stop having to go to that ghetto Walmart.” I know “ghetto Walmart?” but it’s the truth. There was one other Walmart in my neighborhood and it was known as the ghetto Walmart. So when I received the essay assignment I knew immediately where I wanted to go. At ghetto Walmart the norms became abnormal and the abnormal things started to be accepted. The Walmart Company knows how to get costumers to come into their stores, I’ll give them that, but something just went wrong with that one.

The Victorian Era is well known for puffy skirts and restricting formal garments while the Progressive Era was known for its more flamboyant attire and the World War II Era for its more conservative style to ration for the war. The history of clothing and fashion calls to question its importance in distinguishing identities of different groups of people as well as marking the different stages of the country’s cultural, political, and economic history. How are the different clothing styles reflective of the values and lifestyle of the multicultural United States and more importantly, how did it contribute to the creation of the American identity? 17th century inhabitants of the North American continent exhibited vastly different wardrobe choices

It is convenient for someone to take barrow to do shopping. But in the situation of 2 or even more people, the barrow will distract the person from shopping who takes care of the barrow. He is restricted or set alone. He has to pay so much attention to the barrow that it may reduce the enthusiasm of shopping. However the shopping basket will not affect so much.

Walmart employees, customers, and suppliers have seen their fair share of Walmart’s bad side. While Walmart’s founder, Sam Walton, claims to make their employees feel like they “are working for them” and that they care Walmart has done such a horrific job with the way they treat their employees that one day, the workers decided to walk out and go on strike. They walked out on the grounds that they “were emblazoned with the workers’ grievances: poverty wages, miserly benefits, dignity denied” (Eidelson 1). They felt like they weren’t only taking a stand against Walmart, but also taking a stand for the younger generations to come. Walmart’s employees are getting treated unfairly and are underpaid. The CEO’s, Michael Duke, annual salary gives him more money in an hour than an employee who works full-time would make in an entire year. In Bangladesh, over 100 workers “died in a factory without outdoor fire escapes, NGOs blame Walmart for pushing deadly shortcuts” (Eidelson 1). Not only are the employees being poorly paid by Walmart, but they are paying their life to Walmart just to make enough money to barely get by. Walmart even made a pregnant employee work around chemicals that eventually made her ill. After a trip to the doctor, Walmart allowed her to be put on a lighter duty, so they made her a door greeter; however, they

“Up Against Wal-Mart” by Karen Olsson, a senior editor at Texas Monthly and who’s article appeared in Mother Jones, introduces her article through the perspective of a Wal-Mart worker. She focuses on the negatives of Wal-Mart by telling the real life struggles of different Wal-Mart employees. “Progressive Wal-Mart. Really.” by Sebastian Mallaby, a columnist for the Washington Post, focuses his article on what Wal-Mart critics say and attempts to defend Wal-Mart by comparing Wal-Mart to other retailers. Even though Karen Olsson and Sebastian Mallaby both examine the negative effects of Wal-Mart, Olsson berates Wal-Mart’s unfair treatment towards employees and the unlivable wages that the world’s largest retailer provides while Mallaby

Whether it's a brand new 59” LCD widescreen television or merely a pack of gum, each purchase you make from a Walmart store inadvertently results in a higher price paid; both within your community as well as the greater world around you. Relying entirely upon you-the ever consuming scavenger – to fuel the bustling utopia of the manufacturing industry, exists Walmart. More importantly, Walmart relies upon the oblivion towards matters outside of our own lives that we as society generally project. However, by looking past our own greed in a world full of price cuts and sales, we can expose Walmart for what it truly is; an entirely corrupt corporation feeding off of countries' vulnerabilities and reaping the benefits.

“Over the course of [a few years after Wal-Mart entered a community], retailers' sales of men’s' and boys' apparel dropped 44% on average, hardware sales fell by 31%, and lawn and garden sales fell by 26%. In towns without Wal-Marts that are close to towns with Wal-Marts, sales in general merchandise declined immediately after Wal-Mart stores opened. After ten years, sales declined by a cumulative 34%.”

1. Go to a public place and OBSERVE the community of people in that place for at least 30 minutes; perhaps as long as 60 minutes. In your report, describe the setting and note the date and time of your observation. Describe the element of “community” that you observed.

The 1920’s, also called the roaring 20’s, was a time of change. During this time period the fashion for both men and women was changing immensely. The aftermath of WWI caused America to enter a vigorous era. As a result of the role of women during the war, many customs and morals were changing. The Stock Market started booming, many new dances and music came about, and women got the right to vote and enter the workforce. There was an uprise in almost every activity, and fashion was definitely one (Tirocchi, Anna and Laura). Although fashion varied throughout the decade, one could notice a drastic change from the prior fashion.

Ragan Fretwell - Case 23: Walmart: But We Do Give Them a 10% Employee Discount

A. Wal-Mart realized through third party studies and internal research that the Chinese customer were significantly more cost-sensitive than those in other countries and that there existed a strong, established culture of frequently shopping around to find the absolute lowest prices. Through these studies, Wal-Mart also realized that customer satisfaction level greatly influenced customer loyalty in China. The greatest determinant of this satisfaction was made up of perceived value. The perceived value is composed of three sub factors: (1) Product price, (2) Relative price and (3) Promotion. The other factors for customer satisfaction in descending order of its importance are Image,