Posted on 07/19/2006 3:24:40 PM PDT by Graybeard58
The brawl between Wal-Mart and its union critics is growing fiercer as groups on both sides, fighting over whether the company is good or bad, started attack-style Web sites maligning each other's motives and politics.
More than a year after unions began two political-style campaign groups attacking Wal-Mart Stores Inc., the world's largest retailer, for what they say are low wages and skimpy benefits, the language is turning meaner and more personal.
Last week, Working Families for Wal-Mart, a group financed primarily by Wal-Mart, started http://paidcritics.com to reveal what it described as "the real motives of the union leaders behind the campaign against Wal-Mart."
It characterized one of its leading critics, Andrew Grossman of union-backed Wal-Mart Watch, as "a political operative with a checkered past" in a section called "Paid Critic of the Week" that also lambasted Wayne Hanley, the head of the Canadian chapter of the United Food and Commercial Workers union.
The site is part of Wal-Mart's aggressive defense that started last year against its increasingly organized critics. Wal-Mart won't say how much it is spending, but it has set up a political campaign-style "war room" staffed by consultants, hired Washington lobbyists, formed the Working Families group and created another Web site called Wal-Mart Facts.
In response to the new site, union-financed WakeUpWalMart.com started its own Web site yesterday, www.abunchofgreedyrightwingliarswhoworkforwalmart.com, which attacks Wal-Mart's public-relations and lobbying figures.
"These great guys who love to stretch the truth (or what mom called liars) honed their special Wal-Mart skills on an array of right-wing political campaigns," the Web site reads.
In a letter to Democratic members of Congress about Wal-Mart's efforts, WakeUpWalMart said that the attacks were reminiscent of a campaign by a pro-Bush group, Swift Boat Veterans for Truth, that questioned Sen. John Kerry's Vietnam War military record during the 2004 presidential race.
Steven Silvers, a corporate-reputation-management expert who has worked for 25 years advising public and private companies on strategic communications, called paidcritics.com "a name-calling, nastily aggressive little Web site" that marked an escalation in Wal-Mart's battle with critics.
"The company's latest move comes right out of the Swift Boat playbook. And it could become standard procedure for other corporations that find themselves in the center of public controversy," Silvers wrote in his blog Scatterbox. Silvers said that neither he nor his company, GBSM, Inc., do any work for the unions or Wal-Mart.
Experts said that there is no clear winner yet in the public-relations battle. Union groups decry what they call Wal-Mart's low wages, poor health benefits and destruction of local economies. Wal-Mart said it creates jobs, provides low-cost insurance for employees and saves the average family $2,300 a year by keeping prices low.
"The jury is still out," said Paul Argenti, a professor of corporate communication and reputation management at the Tuck School of Business at Dartmouth University.
Both sides have been going at each other since two unions started separate campaigns in the spring of 2005 to pressure Wal-Mart for change after failing for years to organize its stores: WakeUpWalMart.com, funded by the United Food and Commercial Workers; and Wal-Mart Watch, backed by the Service Employees International Union.
Both groups said they want to pressure Wal-Mart into becoming a better employer, not to run it out of business.
In response, Wal-Mart hired a team of about 35 consultants at Edelman, which bills itself as the world's largest independently owned public-relations company, as well as Washington lobbyists.
It has also started several initiatives, including adding more affordable health-care plans for employees - as low as $11 a month, adopting ambitious environmental goals and increasing diversity among employees and its sea of suppliers.
"At this point I would certainly say that we are gaining ground," said a spokeswoman for Wal-Mart, Sarah Clark. "From our standpoint, 127 million customers shop at our stores in the U.S. every week. We know many of them value the savings, the job opportunities and the charitable giving we provide their communities."
Patricia Edwards, a portfolio manager and retail analyst at Wentworth, Hauser & Violich in Seattle, which manages $8.2 billion in assets and holds 51,000 Wal-Mart shares, said that investors are getting tired of hearing the same arguments back and forth.
"When you get to the point where you have escalating blog wars, it gets to be a little like political-ad-campaign season. I use my remote to mute every single one of those ads," she said.
Argenti said that Wal-Mart has gotten better at defending itself since last year. But he said that the paidcritics.com site was an ill-advised political attack campaign that reacts to the critics rather than taking the initiative.
"It's a really bad idea. What companies need to do is to rise above the argument and set your own agenda," he said.
Wal-Mart's Clark said that Working Families for Wal-Mart is a separate and independent group.
The group has a steering committee headed by Andrew Young, a civil-rights leader and a former mayor of Atlanta, but the operations are run by a staff housed in Edelman offices.
Ping.
Don't you just love it?
WAlMart stay away from any labor unions. They have cost American workers millions of jobs, steel, airlines automobiles, industrial, etc. The only real unions that are left are the public service sector, and there is no hope for them. Once the American public gets enough of their BS, its curtains for them!!!
He said it violated ERISA, which mandates that only the federal government can regulate health benefit plans, not states.
Just doing the pinging that Gabz is temporarily unavailable to do.
Yes, just the other day, I saw hundreds of people in chains, being herded into a Walmart where they will be forced to apply for jobs.
If you don't like the pay and benefits, then don't work there.
Why do liberals always want to decide things for everyone else? Do I even need to ask this question?
That's great news, thanks for posting it.
Can you refer me to the article or announcement?
Yeah right, for the past 70 years the UAW just wanted to make GM and Ford better employers. While the auto unions fight over who gets to eat the carcasses of their employers, the unionless Honda expands its US manufacturing. The problem is not Wal-Mart or Ford or GM or John Deere, it is the UNIONS.
Thanks. I have been entrusted with Gabz's ping list temporarily and I just pinged people to it.
Good to see that there are some judges left who know the law and use common sense.
I am very familiar with the union's battle against Wal-Mart. Unionized retailers have become the exception in the last 40 years and Wal-Mart is by no means the only one, it's just the most successful one.
They figure if they can bring Wal-Mart down, the others will topple. What good that will do, I haven't figured out yet but ....
Yeah, it would be wrong to criticize a presidential candidate during a campaign, unless your accusations are fabricated, like Dan Rather's about Bush. Then it's OK.
These unions bash Wal-Mart non-stop and then curl into the fetal posotion when Wal-Mart responds. This is exactly what the Left did in 2004 when they bashed Bush over his Guard service, "Bush lied", etc. but when the Swift Boat Vets responded..."Now, now there's too much discourse and negativity in politics blah blah blah..." They remind me of Ric Flair who used to "beg" for mercy when he was getting beat down only to sucker-punch the opponent when he wasn't looking.
I just joined their group.
Gawd I hate unions.
Thanks for the ping.
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