Watching Wal-Mart at Midnight(bread line of 21 century?)

WSJ ^ | 09/20/10

[TigerLikesRooster]

* September 20, 2010, 6:45 PM ET

Watching Wal-Mart at Midnight

This comment from Wal-Mart Stores Inc. has been making the rounds on blogs and newswires the past few days. It says it all about the state of the tepid U.S. recovery. The Journal’s Al Lewis wrote about it yesterday.

Bill Simon, CEO of Wal-Mart’s U.S. business, at a Goldman Sachs conference last week, on behavior at a Walmart store around midnight at the end of a month:

“The paycheck cycle we’ve talked about before remains extreme. It is our responsibility to figure out how to sell in that environment, adjusting pack sizes, large pack at sizes the beginning of the month, small pack sizes at the end of the month. And to figure out how to deal with what is an ever-increasing amount of transactions being paid for with government assistance.

“And you need not go further than one of our stores on midnight at the end of the month. And it’s real interesting to watch, about 11 p.m., customers start to come in and shop, fill their grocery basket with basic items, baby formula, milk, bread, eggs,and continue to shop and mill about the store until midnight, when electronic — government electronic benefits cards get activated and then the checkout starts and occurs. And our sales for those first few hours on the first of the month are substantially and significantly higher.

[OCCASparky]

Also, if kidnappers aren’t going to Walmart, they’re missing a fish-in-a-barrel situation.

WHY? Chances are, the "parents" would either not care nor would they notice, and even if they did, how does one pay ransom in food stamps?

[Chickensoup]

Perhaps they are out at midnight because they don’t have anywhere to be the next morning and they usually get up at noon.

There is an entire class of people who get up in the afternoon and go to bed in the wee hours. Because Why NOT.

This man doesnt know them.

[BubbaJunebug]

Here’s your Peach Card customers right here

www.peopleofwalmart.com

[Newtoidaho]

Might not take a week; every store shelf would be stripped within a day, there is only about a 2 day supply of gasoline in the distribution chain at any given time.
Most people would run out of food in their homes within a week, for sure.
Chaos would occur within a very short period of time.

[Myrddin]

I learned a similar lesson in 2001 at a skating rink in Chula Vista. The first Friday night of the month was different from other visits. The parking lot was full of armed off duty cops. I purchased a ticket and entered the building. Whoa! It was wall to wall black people. You could barely walk on the floor. Skate? You've got to be kidding. I left the building to ask for a refund. The best they would do is a rain check for a future Friday night. I asked the cops what was going on. It's "mom's night". The first Friday night of the month is when the welfare moms dump their kids at the skating rink. The monthly government check has arrived. I returned the following Friday night. The normal regulars were present. That included about 20 black skaters who are a very skilled and enjoyable part of the regular crowd.

[Nea Wood]

I’ve noticed that, too. They’re always fat. I’ve also notice a lot of them have hair extensions, long, manicured nails, and walk out to the parking lot and get into very nice vehicles.

[pfflier]

84.6% of statistics are made up on the spot.

[meyer]

There are also people that work afternoon and night shifts. I’m not saying that this is the bulk of the WalMart 3-AM crowd, but if I worked afternoons and got off work at midnight, It wouldn’t be a horribly bad idea to do some shopping at 0100 hrs when the stores were not quite so crowded.

[sjmjax]

Love the poster.

Just need to photoshop Coons face on the dog.

[ansel12]

Feed the lefty propaganda machine, way to go.

[proud American in Canada]

LOL! Those people are pretty sad-looking.

[BubbaJunebug]

dont understand your reply?

[RadiationRomeo]

assistance from the government for buying electronics???!!!
I didn’t know about this. I’ll get mad later...

Anyways, back in the 1980s I worked at a Burger King in a big city while I was in college. We were always ready for ‘welfare day’ and had triple the normal amount of workers.

[TomGuy]

adjusting pack sizes

Yeah. Less content. Same package size. Same or higher package price.

Many food packagers have been doing that for decades.

Remember when the large can of coffee was actually 3-pounds or 48 ounces?

[ansel12]

Who do you think put that link together and why, it is just another part of the war against WalMart by the left.

[TomGuy]

I now know to avoid walmart on the first of the month.

I notice a sizeable increase in the number of customers in several stores right around the first and fifteenth of each month.

[Dilbert San Diego]

Those EBT queens need to get with the program with Michelle Obama’s “Let’s Move” program.

Glad to hear these EBT queens made it out of Michelle’s so-called “food desert” so they can get their groceries. (sarcasm)

[Gaffer]

Description is virtually to a “T”....very rarely you see a departure from it.

[Mind-numbed Robot]

Felling my blood--

Soon that perhaps be Feeling my blood ...?

[sarge83]

The employed in my neck of the woods call the first of the month “mothers day”. Lots of those food stamp cards, SSI checks etc... hit the economy.

My parents business is located across from the cable tv company. The deadbeats won’t pay for anything else but they damn sure make their way in to pay that cable bill. It’s like a mad house the first 5 days of the month around that place. Bread and circuses...