Ok, so almost everyone (at least in the USA) knows what Wal-Mart is. It's a store that offers clothes, toys, sporting goods, electronics, and various other product lines. Recently, Wal-Mart has been building "Super Centers" that literally have *everything* from standard groceries, to everything a normal Wal-Mart has.

These "Super Centers" are putting other, smaller, stores and shops out of business. In the FOX TV show 'King of the Hill', the writers have an entire show dedicated to what these "Super Centers" do to the local shops. (In the show it's called "Mega-Lo-Mart".)

The poll is: what you think about Wal-Mart and what you think should be done about the company. :rolling:

Poll Information
This poll contains 2 question(s). 31 user(s) have voted.
You may not view the results of this poll without voting.

Poll Results: The evil that is WalMart. (31 votes.)

What do you think about WalMart? (Choose 1)
* It's a fine place to shop and it saves me money. - 19% (6)
* It's a necessary evil. - 19% (6)
* I hate it and refuse to go there. - 42% (13)
* What is WalMart again? - 6% (2)
* Just the results for me. - 13% (4)

What do you think should be done about WalMart? (Choose 1)
* Nothing. They know how to do business, and shouldn't be held responsible for companies that can't compete. - 32% (10)
* They should have certain regulations keeping their growth under control, but that's it. - 29% (9)
* They should have their business broken up and kept seperate, with regulations preventing them from creating local monopolies. - 23% (7)
* WalMart should be totally shut down, and each of their stores should be sold to Target, Kmart, Sears, and other companies at "roll-back" prices! - 10% (3)
* Just the results for me. - 6% (2)

Hate it, and I want it regulated.

Off course, Sweden is so far blessed from them, but I've heard that they want to come here to open business. If they do, I'll be in the lines prohibiting their access.

Well... becoming an uber-store (AKA Uber-Wal-mart) is kind of handy since you can basically find everything you need in the same place... but that's a double-edged sword, since it gives a hit to smaller buisnesses. THAT isn't good. Monopolies are evil.

Wal-Mart=Okay
Uber-Wal-Mart=Not Okay

In time something will be done about wal-mart when it starts effecting the government in a more negitive way then at this point in time... This could take years to decades to come to pass but until people start complaining in masses or they piss some big shot politicion off wal-mart will continue to dominate you're suburban towns and city blocks with their "blue light special prices"... quantity is just overwhelming sometimes...

Wal-Mart is not worth the seconds it took me to type this, nor the minimal thought I put into making this a sentence. :p

EDIT: :rolleyes:
Meaning that it's so despicable that it remains beneath my notice.

[ October 21, 2005, 03:57: Message edited by: Felinoid ]

Went to Wal-Mart once. Junk in my honest but not humble opinion. Target is much better.

@Big Cat: You have no opinion on Wal-Mart? Perhaps I can sway you with catnip...

Wal-Mart has raised the standard of living for many, many Americans. For those of us with enough money to shop elsewhere, the homogeny of the poor can be replaced by the homogeny of the not so poor. Either way, we all need bath towels, right?

I like Walmart, but they don't get a monopoly on my business. They still don't carry everything I want...

i have a clan in travian.com called walmart 55 in server 1 and walmart 54 server 2. The clan description

Of stores and man i sing, the first who came,
compelled by wealth, an exile out of Oklahoma,
To Arkansas and the Rogers mountains,
much buffeted in minimart and in public market
by violence of the store owners, through that long rage,
that lasting hate, of shallow brained small local business,

And he suffered much, also, in JCPenney,
till he should build his store and bring his products to Travian,
whence, in time, The megastore race,
the enormous parking lot fathers,
rose and the great store of everlasting Wal*mart 54.

Help me, O cashier lady, recall the reasons: Why,
why did the store owners of local drive a man
So known for cheap products, for massive products,
through so many slanders and lawsuits?
Was there slight, affront, or outrage?
Is vindictiveness an attribute of the competitors? It's not original, it's taken from Virgil.

What can you say about it? If those little store should survice, they will. If they cannot, well they cannot. Walmart is not the only megastore out there. You have Carrefour from France which invaded Malaysia in late 90's, then Malaysia got our own megastore, Gaint and The Store. It's natural selection, naturally. You cannot stop them. Evil is the one who tries to stop society moving naturally.

They are probably one of the most sexist companies on earth - most of the staff are female, yet most of the management are male hmmmmm Its proven that women make better managers, but while they will 'modernize' by killing small businesses (killing culture), they still refuse to update their sexist ways.

Wal-Mart own ASDA over here I think -or is it Matalan? Anyway I answered as if for them. It's not the supermarkets that are taking over, it's the giant shopping centres that are springing up everywhere

monopoly is never good, thankfully in britain we have several massive chains all battling eachother for customers:

tesco, asda, sainsburys, marks and sparks, safeway, morrisons

to mention a few, in my town we have all of the above

My wife hates Wal-Mart, but is only because she considers it too big and crowded.

As far as I'm concerned, if you can't run with the big dogs, then get out of their way. Small businesses that are smart learn to adapt and compete differently.

With all the whining about monopoly, people seem to forget that in many places it was the small business that had the monopoly in their locale before Wal Mart moved in.

I've been to a Wal-Mart four, maybe five times (in four different states!), and never when there is any other alternative for shopping. Funny, I've never been to that same one twice, and never to the one closest to my home. I've never had a shopping experience in one that wasn't somehow disappointing.

Competition is fine, as long as the playing field is level. From what I hear - and I don't care enough about the issue to delve into it, so don't start on me about accepting hearsay as fact - Wal-Mart goes out of their way to preclude the possibility of competition.

I don't care. They sell crap in an unpleasant environment. I'm very glad to have alternatives.

Well said TGS.

Rally, while I do agree with you to a certain point, I have to ask, is the Tide detergent, or the Gillette razors, or any of the other name brand staples that Wal Mart sells inferior to the ones sold under the same brands elsewhere? I shop occasionally at Wal Mart for staples, though most of my shopping of thist type is done at a locally owned grocery or the wholesale club (Sam's or Costco).

If we want to rile against Wal Mart, we have to also take on the following (Americans anyway)

Alberstons
Amazon
Best Buy
Costco
CVS
Federated
GAP
Home Depot
Kroger
Kohl's
Limited
Lowe's
May Department Stores
Radio Shack
Safeway
Sears
Target
TJX
Walgreen

All of these companies come in and run local stores out of business, and they are also the 20 biggest retailer's in the US (including Wal Mart, per Amex.com). I have to say that if I stopped shopping at all of these companies I would have a hard time finding the things I "need".

@DW: I'll grant you that brand-name merchandise is the same no matter where you get it. However, the when a manufacturer has a range of products available, it seems to me that Wal-Mart stocks only the lowest-quality line, and that never meets my needs. Also, the things they sell that aren't brand name are, IMO, crap.

So even if I ever would go to a Wal-Mart for staples, I'd still have to go to another store for all the stuff I won't buy there. They don't provide enough savings on those few staples to make it worth the effort of the extra stop.

Wal-Mart made it's first 100 billion by killing off the small town businesses. The stores offered reasonable prices in out of the way place -- prices the residents would normally need to drive long distances to get (and who doesn't want to pay less for something). Wal-Mart was fairly underhanded in many aspects during the early building of the empire -- it brought a lot of jobs to small communities and would pressure small town politicians. Wal-Mart was also known for targeting specific product groups (taking little to no profit) in order to destroy competition in a community (then raise the prices to a profitable level). It was really only a few years ago the guiding policy of Wal-Mart was to stay out of large metropolitan areas.

Having already destroyed the small businesses across America, Wal-Mart now has it's sights on the middle and large businesses -- Target, K-Mart/Sears, and numerous grocery stores. The super Wal-Marts have more room and better presentation to after this new area of business.

The issues addressed by 'King of the Hill' were present 20-30 years ago. Wal-Mart is a powerful dynasty in the retail market and other companies had better learn to compete or fall in the wake.

I don't shop there, but I don't think anything needs to be done about it. Wal-Mart does not have a monopoly over anything. AFAIK, there is nothing sold in their stores that is unique. Every single item can be purchased somewhere else. As such, I don't shop there and take my business elsewhere. There's nothing I need that I can only buy at Wal-Mart, and while it may be less convenient to go elsewhere, they are not a company that is deserving of my business.

There's a spoof on Wal-Mart stores on jibjab (http://jibjab.com)

:spin: Thank you, Aldeth, for a good laugh. That was great!

Same happens here, and is in all kind of busines, like Zara, Burberry, etc.; I work in a Burberry's brand and I see everyday how it works, we have 6 stores in 200 mts (one for boys, one for girls, one for woman, and so on) and there are also another stores around but you can see always 10 customers at Burberrys and sometimes 1 or 2 on the others.
Same is happening with El Corte Ingles, a mega store which started selling clothes as competition with Zara and Burberry and now is a mega store that sells from fruits to trips to the Caribean. Now opened another hiper-mega-store, adding stuff like the one Ikea sells. So, you think Ikea is going down? I think no, because almost every people bought something on Ikea and seems that they like so they will keep buying there.

I also forgot to mention this...

Here in UT, USA, Wal-Mart is synonymous with 'white-trash'. :doh: Why? Just enter one and you'll see them. There’s the fat dude wearing overalls without a shirt, or the skinny lady not wearing a bra, but wearing ripped, thrift store clothes. The list goes on and on, but those are two examples.

Also, almost all Wal-Marts here have a McDonalds inside them...which makes 2 evil companies under the same roof. :mommy: :rolling:

I have a Sam's Club card, and will shop there from time to time.

I mostly use them for processing my digital pictures.

They have a friggin' monopoly on the 'stuff-for-cheap', and it is greedy companies like this that ruin small buisnesses. It should be split up to prevent them from having a monopoly, but should not be abolished, because that would put tons of people (it employs the most (or second most) employees in the world) out of work, but it should be restricted.

They are powerful because of their business model. They have huge stores, thus spreading fixed costs out over more products. They don't have comissioned staff, so wages are kept down. The stores are laid out efficiently so you can find what you are looking for. Mind you they don't have every movie so people will still go to places like Cinema 1, or ever videogame, so EB stays in business. They don't have much of a selection of books, so book stores are safe. They cater to the mainstream, so if you want something off the beaten path, then you still need to look elsewhere. But if it's mainstream stuff you want, they're probably cheapest...

Wal-Mart made its money by giving the masses what they want. They are not some evil corporation ruthlessly forcing the "helpless small businesses" into bankruptcy. In fact, the employees at Wal-Mart generally earn more money than they did at the small stores and prices are lower.

With that said, like pretty much everyone else here, I won't shop at Wal-Mart. The products that they sell are almost always the lowest quality things available. Even in the cases of name-brands, it is generally the lowest quality of each brand. When it comes to things such as electronics, auto supplies, and so on, Wal-Mart will not carry the best brands but will instead carry the low performance, low priced brands.

The food products in their superstores are substandard. Put anything that you buy there into your refrigerator for more than a day or two and it will be ruined.

Here in UT, USA, Wal-Mart is synonymous with 'white-trash'. [doh] Why? Just enter one and you'll see them. There’s the fat dude wearing overalls without a shirt, or the skinny lady not wearing a bra, but wearing ripped, thrift store clothes. The list goes on and on, but those are two examples.Heh. That one is true and pretty much stopped me from going anywhere near one of their stores.

Jim Cramer equates Wal-Mart to the old Soviet stores.

Jim Cramer probably never saw any of the old Soviet stores :) .

Walmart is quite useful for a certain segment of the population. That is, those who make average wage, or less (the average wage is about $24,000, in US, I think). It's all well and good to say shop at speciality store and pay higher price when you have spare income, but otherwise...

Also, it is convenient to get most of stuff you need in the same place, and moreover, in places I've been, most of these stores are accesible by public transportation. Which does not matter if you have a car, but, contrary to public opinion, not everybody in US has one (at all times, anyhow).

If I had a choice, I would not buy food from there, though :)