[xp38]

I only included the top 10 listings...the article link includes all 500. I found it surprising to me that Microsoft came in 72nd overall.

[aShepard]

Score one for the Chi-Com suppliers of the world's largest company!

[xp38]

Sorry there is an error...this article was posted on the Globe website yesterday March 31 2002. The Globe however does not publish a print edition on Sundays.

[Revolting cat!]

A fine mess Stanley, you took us from a producing society to a consuming society!

[Wolfie]

Damn, the things you can accomplish with sweatshop foreign labor!

[xp38]

Another surprise...guess which company is clinging to the bubble spot at No. 500...why the grey old lady herself the New York Times Co....Lets hope its bubble bursts soon.

[SamAdams76]

No surprise there, with Microsoft placing 72nd. This list was stack-ranked by total revenues. Just imagine how much money gets spent at an average Wal-Mart each day and then multiply by the number of stores. If the list was stack-ranked by gross margin (difference between total revenues and total expenses), I'm sure Microsoft would be at or near the top.

There are a lot of Wal-Mart bashers here but I think Wal-Mart has done a great thing for America. They completely revolutionized retailing and put out of business a lot of inefficient retailers (mostly mom-and-pops) that greatly benefited the consumer. I remember as a child being dragged around by my mother every Saturday morning to about a half-dozen or so of these "mom-and-pop" stores. It was nothing but aggravation. Half the things you wanted were out of stock and you had to come back another day. What they did have in stock, you paid an arm & a leg for (comparatively). People may complain about customer service these days but those mom-and-pop stores were terrible. The owner-operators were about the crankiest people on earth and everytime you walked into the store, you got the impression you were being an imposition upon them. As well, the owners of these mom-and-pops would typically staff their little stores with family members who, to put it mildly, were not the sharpest knives in the drawer. Apparently all the competent family members had moved on to bigger and better things.

Nowadays, you can jump into Wal-Mart for about a half-hour and get maybe 95% of your daily household needs at very reasonable prices. I am not "nostagic" for the good old days at all and I'm glad to see the mom-and-pops gone.