The Wal-Mart You Don't Know

Fast Company magazine ^ | november 2003 | charles fishman

[em2vn]

A gallon-sized jar of whole pickles is something to behold. The jar is the size of a small aquarium. The fat green pickles, floating in swampy juice, look reptilian, their shapes exaggerated by the glass. It weighs 12 pounds, too big to carry with one hand. The gallon jar of pickles is a display of abundance and excess; it is entrancing, and also vaguely unsettling. This is the product that Wal-Mart fell in love with: Vlasic's gallon jar of pickles.

[Romulus]

You are not free to shop there if all you care about is the lowest price, and you don't care who has to be squeezed, or how hard, in order for you to have it.

I'd say that if you shop there based on price, you have a duty to inform yourself about just what has to happen for those low prices to be available to you, and whether you want to be part of it.

Full disclosure: I used to buy pet food and vitamins there. That was before the illegal alien janitors scandal, but after the forced overtime story was known. I've felt increasingly uneasy about shopping there (it's very, very hard to force yourself to pass up a bargain, I know), but last week I found to my relief I was able to resist the urge and go someplace else. It isn't easy to turn down something attractive. Maybe a habit of fasting will help over the long run.

[drlevy88]

When I go to Wal Mart or elsewhere, I look for US made, or at least made in a country that has announced no hostility towards the USA. I find I have about the same odds of finding it at Wal Mart as at K Mart or Target. So much China stuff everywhere I go, even at high end retailers.

[netmilsmom]

When American textile workers earn less that my computer engineer Hubby, I will need to buy products made in other countries.

American Unions priced our products out of my range. I try to go with toys made in America, but geez, let's lay some blame where it belongs.

[BureaucratusMaximus]

What!? You don't like pickles?

I dunno...seeing that my wife in pregnant (and with our first WOO HOO!)...a gallon size container of pickles might not be a bad buy right now. ;)

[Landru]

"disrepear?????????????"

HA!!
Think that one's good?

...read the tagline.

[SamAdams76]

BTW, Vlasic didn't have to sell gallon jars in Wal-Mart for $2.97. Consumers are willing to pay premium prices for premium products elsewhere. That's why you never see Bose wave radios in Wal-Mart or Godiva chocolates. Those companies prefer to keep their products exclusive and they remain very, very profitable.

If I bought my wife a box of $2.97 chocolates at Wal-Marts for Valentine's Day, I think I'll be sleeping in the shed for a while.

[The_Eaglet]

Here's my approach to shopping: 1) Buying American is the ideal
2) Don't buy anything from Red China

I often check where something is made before I buy it.

I had not seen American-grown Coffee at Wal-Mart at all, but other specialty coffee shops have the Kona Hawaii beans which are very good. I haven't seen Puerto Rican coffee in stores yet, but it can be ordered through Café Rico .

[SeeRushToldU_So]

Fast Company is a magazine for the wealthy, urban, uber-consumer who probably wears sunglasses and a hat when he goes to WalMart

I am neither urban or wealthy, but I always wear a hat and sunglasses. I also shop at Wal-Mart while wearing them.

[em2vn]

Also,you would be eating a $2.97 box of chocolates.I hope Wal-Mart is never able to sell discounted romance.

[Mamzelle]

re: Fastcompany uber-yuppies

Hey, I've read and enjoyed the conspicious-consumer preenings and posturings ("Investment Purchases!") in Fast Company a time or two--but I don't take it too seriously, any more than the fashion magazines I sometimes pick up. I guess the hottest new electronic toys are for boys the way Louis Vuitton $600 plastic handbags are for girls. Shopping porn.

A catalogue from Hammer-Schlemmerer (sp?) does the same job for free, though.

[Mamzelle]

re: If I bought my wife a box of $2.97 chocolates at Wal-Marts for Valentine's Day, I think I'll be sleeping in the shed for a while. )))

Actually, Sam-- at Sam's they have divine Belgian-made chocolates for a song. The key is Belgium, not Godiva. They are much better than French or Swiss. Sam's had a three-box set for ten bucks--the free tasting identified the high-quality meltiness and the usual choco-rush. We locarbs can have the occasional chocolate, you know, and I've learned to prefer the bitter dark stuff over the too-sweet milk chocolate, anyway.

Bose you can find at outlets.

[RaginCajunTrad]

Wal Mart is a predator, pure and simple. They move into small towns (sometimes larger ones, too), low-ball prices to drive out the small-time competition, and then raise prices.

They prey on their employees. They "schedule" the employees for say, 22-28 hours of work a week to keep them out of certain benefit programs and then work them longer.

I remember two jokes employees had about Wal Mart.

1. What do you call someone who makes ten cents more an hour than minimum wage?

answer: department manager

2. Customer: Can you help me with this?

Wal Mart employee: What are you asking me for? I only work here.

Myself, I've said many times that Wal Mart should use for advertising, "Shop at Wal Mart, where the service is non-existent."

I am a CPA in a small town. My wife worked at the local Wal Mart for a couple of years. I have friends that are basic employees there and some are managers.

Wal Mart is a predator. It preys on the towns it locates in and after taking over, it preys on its customers.

Wal Mart is like legalized gambling; the social cost outweighs any financial benefits derived. By destroying the shops on Main Street, Wal Mart destroys communities.

There is becoming a dangerous sameness in American towns. Wal Mart, McDonald's, Burger King, Taco Bell, Shoney's, etc.

They all look alike.

[Non-Sequitur]

bump

[RaginCajunTrad]

I know of a small town, about 5000 people, maybe. They had a little Wal Mart back in the early 80's. Well, it shut down a bunch of the local shops, but it wasn't making enough money. So Bentonville closed it down.

Then the small town had neither the Wal Mart nor the small shops.

In the mid 90's, a casino opened a few miles from that town. Guess what, Wal Mart came back.

Predator!

[Mamzelle]

I've gone through countless vaccuums in my life. I even wore out Royals and Kirbys--these two brands were the best portables, and they were heavy and uncomfortable to push. Final verdict--invest in a central system and lose the carpets, go hard floors and area rugs. I love my central unit-- Even the best vaccuums are going to through nasty trash into the air, and it turned out that installing a central unit with the most powerful engine was still a good bit less than the top-of-the-line Kirby.

[Jalapeno]

LOL, only in America...

[Old Professer]

Yeah, I know - some people think they can flout the "Law." :>)

[Landru]

"Yeah, I know - some people think they can flout the 'Law.'"

HA!
Great stuff, Professor.

...I mean "brevity" & all that. {g}

[drlevy88]

So we get pinched between two groups of commies? No Fair!

[Search4Truth]

"The ability to buy a jug of pickles so big it can barely even fit inside the refrigerator is what makes America the greatest country in the history of the world."

And for a price that amounts to a couple hours labor for a working class man. God bless America!

(They store just fine in the pantry and should be eaten a room temperature.)