Walmart Merchant of Doom

Is Wal-Mart ruining the local businesses in America? Most professional business men can agree that Wal-Mart affects the United States economy in many different ways. Wal-Mart is an American public corporation that runs a chain of large, discount department stores. It is the world's largest public corporation by revenue according to the 2008 Fortune Global 500. However this corporation has contraverisal issues about how they do their sales and the long term affects they put in the economy. Professionals will agree that Wal-Mart has hurt many community businesses as Wal-Mart open in areas around them. There have been common statistics for when a Wal-Mart

In 1962, Wal-Mart opened their first store in Rogers, Arkansas. In 1970, Wal-Mart's first distribution center and home office in Bentonville, Ark. open and Wal-Mart went public on the New York Stock Exchange. Just nine years from that, Wal-Mart's annual sales exceeded one billion dollars. In 1988, Wal-Mart super centers opened across the country. In a merely three years from that, Wal-Mart opened their own store in Mexico City, Mexico; making Wal-Mart an international corporation. Not even sixty years has past, and yet, Wal-Mart is over-powering our country.

Economic - Wal-Mart’s economic performance has been outstanding and its goal of providing quality merchandise at low cost to consumers fits well within this objective. Its stakeholders expect continual improvement to its bottom line, which is especially important to its shareholders, as they are the ones sharing in that return. “…2013, Walmart increased net sales by 5% to $466.1 billion and returned $13 billion to shareholders through dividends and share repurchases” (573). As we will discuss later on, the struggle comes when the company tries to do this in a sustainable and ethical way. Further, the company must provide fair paying jobs and profit to shareholders with as little impact as possible to local merchants. This can be done by purchasing from U.S. manufacturers whenever possible.

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”

Wal-Mart is an American company that was founded in the year 1962 by Sam Walton. The company operates in the retail industry. Notably, the company operates various chains of stores in the entire world which has made the venture a big success in the retail industry. The efficiency and the effectiveness of the company’s operations have seen it ranked the second largest public company in the world (Copeland & Labuski, 2013). The company has over two million workers which makes the leading private corporation employer in the world. Notably, despite the fact that the company is traded publicly, Wal-Mart is more of a family company since Walton’s family still controls over fifty percent of the company’s shares. The company has expanded its business through venturing into external markets such as China, the United Kingdom, North Korea, South Korea, North America, and so forth. However, these markets have produced mixed results in terms of the level of success and profitability. For instance, the German market and the South Korean markets have turned out to be less favorable for the company.

In 1962, Wal-Mart opened their first store in Rogers, Arkansas. In 1970, Wal-Mart's first distribution center and home office in Bentonville, Ark. open and Wal-Mart went public on the New York Stock Exchange. Just nine years from that, Wal-Mart's annual sales exceeded one billion dollars. In 1988, Wal-Mart super centers opened across the country. In a merely three years from that, Wal-Mart opened their own store in Mexico City, Mexico; making Wal-Mart an international corporation. Not even sixty years has past, and yet, Wal-Mart is over-powering our country.

Wal-Mart uses its resources in research since before (2011-2012) for the sole purpose of coming up with new ideas and new ways to sustain itself in the local and global community. Locally it provides electricity in stores from solar panels and wind turbines. “Wal-Mart has taken strides to obtain its sustainability objectives. It has opened two environmentally friendly stores in McKinney, Texas, and Aurora, Colorado.” The company hopes that these experiments will conserve natural resources, save energy, and reduce pollution. In addition, Wal-Mart is attempting to reduce fossil fuel. Its fleet of hybrid trucks is a new technology for going “green (Ferrell, Fraedrich, Ferrell, 2011).” Similarly, Wal-Mart is “Currently working on four main green areas: waste improvement and recycling, natural resources, energy, and social/community impact. Wal-Mart’s long-term goals are to be supplied 100 percent by renewable energy, create zero

Approach any random stranger in America and ask them where they can get their groceries, clothes, appliances, and electronics from at a cheap price and they will most likely say Wal-Mart. A pioneer of the “one-stop-shop”, Wal-Mart has evolved from a small, wholesome shopping mart into a world renown corporation. America has not seen a complete domination of the market in this manner, since the mid 1900’s with General Motors. Wal-Mart has revolutionized the American culture of saving money. With all of the successes, there are also many consequences and controversies that flood the corporation’s name, making it also one of the most infamous and negatively viewed businesses in the world. The unethical working conditions, wages, and lack of benefits combine with the undeniable truth of Wal-Mart’s monopoly of the variety store genre has deemed the company “evil” among many Americans. However, there is a reason as to why Wal-Mart is still exponentially growing in net worth every single day. It is the success story that gives millions hope and strive to achieve. People may look down upon Wal-Mart, but it is a great asset to America as it provides jobs for millions of Americans, offers necessities at the lowest price possible, and is the physical embodiment of the American dream.

Wal-Mart has branded stores in all 50 states and in over 27 countries. Wal-Mart started with humble roots in 1962 by Sam Walton in the small town of Bentonville, Arkansas. Within thirty years, the small local discount retailer grew to one of the largest retail companies in the United States of America. Now it stands as the largest retailer in the world. As the largest retailer, Wal-Mart has gained many detractors. In "The Case for Wal-Mart," Karen De Coster and Brad Edmonds recognize how people “like to attack bigness” (632). Many believe Wal-Mart offers low wage jobs with few employee benefits, discriminates against women, and among many other issues, doesn’t give back to the community (631). In contrast to the constant barrage

Wal-Mart is a “Big Business” and they have held this title for many years. That is not to say they present a negative connotation to most Americans. Quite the contrary, Wal-Mart is a global leader in offering low cost merchandise, a variety of items to choose from, a clean environment in which to shop. Additionally, they are one the largest employers in America, they are still a private corporation, whom stocks rank first and second place. They promote within and they offer training and advancement for their associates (Fishman, 2006).

Consumers increasingly consider the social impact of the money they spend. Some will pay more to support retailers who assert sustainable practices, for instance, by buying products made with recycled material. Others avoid companies notorious for irresponsible or unethical practices, such as outsourcing manufacturing to exploitative sweatshops in under-developed countries. More than ever, retail store owners must consider the ethical and social ramifications of their actions, as well as the actions of their suppliers (Mack, n.d.).

Brian, Your post reminded my of the video from Freeman saying there is a disconnect with how we view business, this seems to be the case for Walmart. Society has a stigma about Walmart which they cannot seem to shake off even with all their efforts. While I agree Walmart should have a individual plan with each community it enters to work together with the community on the environmental impact the store has. Interesting point you brought up how store in Woodbury, CT will try to blend into the other buildings, in my post I talked about a Walmart also blending in to a completely out of the norm space then they are used to - a metropolitan suburb of Manhattan, White Plains, NY. This store could not have the massive one floor store with an even

As much as Walmart may care about the environment, they will not sacrifice some profit now in order to actually help it in the immense way they are able to. These large companies recognize that sustainability is good business, so why will they not actually change? Eventually, they will not have any choice. And by that point, it will cost millions more to reverse the damages. By looking at the environment through an economic lens, Walmart sees the importance of changing but also that the monetary value of changing is not as great as the monetary value of continuing on as they are. Despite already being the largest corporation in the world, Walmart continues to add more harm to the environment because they are still not satisfied with their

Ans:Wal-Mart,Inc runs a chain of large, discount department stores.it is the world’s largest public corporation by revenue. Walmart is the largest private employer and the largest grocery retailer in the United States. Walmart is one of the best known industries all over the world. Its concentration of a single business strategy is the basis of its success over the decades by this strategy without having to rely upon diversification to sustain its growth and competitive advantage. The leading marketing strategies of Wal-Mart are low prices, service and smile. However by adapting this strategy, it has risked itself by putting all of a company’s egg in one industry basket. While its global strategy worked elsewhere, the results were bad in Germany and Korea that Wal-Mart withdrew from those countries.

Wal-Mart now has to rebuild their images, procedures on how they conduct business nationwide and how the use ethical business practices. The New York time article reported, “Wal-Mart announces new ethical and environmental principles complete by 2012”. (Robinson, 2008)