Walmart observations

[TW-Upstate NY]

They still have the lowest shelf prices BUT the differences between them and other competing retailers in the immediate vicinity of any of their stores has become VERY small. In some cases, it amounts to a penny or two. And about Kroger vs. Wal-Mart in the grocery arena, all they've done is take advantage of Kroger screwing up big-time. In short, they've taken advantage of their opponent's unforced errors. And say what you want about them (and again, I'm not a huge fan), you have to admit that during this entire health emergency, they usually have essential items in stock (especially in the area of cleaning supplies) when others have bare shelves. Long gone are the days when they were this folksy curiosity run by some older gentleman who drove an old Ford pickup truck who had managed to elbow aside Sears as the largest retailer sometime in the 80's. And that was all done before the exponential growth spurt they went on in the 90's. Sure their sales increases year over year on the store side of things are not exactly chugging along like they were way back when. On the other hand, how is it even possible to ring up those kind of numbers when you've put stores just about every place you can. The easy days for them of increasing sales just by simply entering new markets and then carpet-bombing them with new stores are gone forever. And as for the places that don't have stores, the reason is simple-in some places they're just flat out not welcome. They recognize that e-commerce is where the growth is but as has been said they've pretty much fallen flat. The only place where they're good at that is at store level-where they pick the order in the store and the customer picks it up. There are times I've actually seen more employees picking orders than there were customers in the store.

[storewanderer]

I agree that they are winning.

Meanwhile employees continue to lose.

Competition continues to lose (some of it their own fault).

Consumers continue to lose for HUGE reasons they cannot fathom, long term.

Peoples from other nations continue to be exploited so Americans can enjoy low prices (long term.........low prices are not free).

I am afraid the employees have already lost. Grocery is no longer a career job for a clerk just starting out except in a few unique circumstances (rural area, or maybe as a butcher). Between the two-tier union agreements which are so bad for the employee, now you have the Wal Mart starting wage dollars above the union starting wages at grocers in a number of markets, and various other watering down of the union contracts, the employees have lost.

I also fail to see any difference in how Wal Mart sources its products vs. Target and various other retailers who sell similar items... people from other nations are being exploited so Americans can enjoy low prices and also so American corporations can earn big profits. The pandemic should have taught us something about this but as I look at my imported mask, we hear about imported vaccines, and I will just stop now and say I don't think it did.

[Alpha8472]

Walmart Neighborhood Markets are becoming less distinctive. The green vests are gone, and they now use the standard Walmart uniform vests. I saw new shopping carts at a Neighborhood Market and they have switched to gray and blue Walmart Carts. There is no Neighborhood Market on the child seat. It just says Walmart and the store number. Perhaps the Neighborhood Market name will be eliminated and these stores will convert to small Walmart stores. They could add in more profitable departments such as Electronics and cell phones. There is much wasted space and the floor space could be converted to merchandise that people actually want to buy. They could become mini-supercenters.

[storewanderer]

I don't know that they are winning anything. They're non-food sales have grown very little in the last 15 years, even with adding higher end electronics. The online retailers they bought tanked after the acquisition because their bases didn't want to buy from Walmart.

Their e-commerce is growing but I doubt that they are outperforming the field (haven't seen anyone make that comparison). Logistics is their strength but long-term growth requires other talents that they lack--staffing and motivating employees, customer service when things go badly. Amazon is a horrible place to work, but they know how to interact with customers and they knew when their own delivery systems weren't working out very well.

They have a bunch of smaller stores of varying size in the DC area, which were proposed before Wall Street pushed them into doing more (and they ultimately pushed back). They have food. Given that Walmart hasn't grown much since they added groceries, it's not surprising. Their model has always been volume. Target has always gone for margins and key demographics---their customers overlap, but the stores are based on different models. Target is much more able to adapt to different circumstances--they seem to be doing fine with their smaller stores, which have gone into urban areas, inner ring suburbs and resorts and to varying degrees, they include food.

Walmart, in the early 2000s, seemed to me to be like Sears in the 80s. A mature chain with little room to grow. Sears had brief, surprising success increasing their base by upgrading women's clothing, but otherwise they remained stuck in a kind of middle road position. Their brick & mortart was solid, while their catalog was in decline. It was costly but relatively easy to lose the catalog. Walmart--back in the 80s was taking advantage of KMart's stumbles (they sold lots of poor quality house brand merchandise) and the growing decline of regional and semi-national discounters. They offered very good service, best prices on name brand merchandise, and generally well kept stores. When I next lived in their territory, the pricing was no longer that extraordinary, the service was non-existent and the stores were inconsistent. They had saturated the markets where they did best (exurban areas with cheap land) and the degraded customer experience along with the rise of Target pretty much meant they would never grab a large chunk of the middle class ever again. The stagnation of their stores, the demand from the Waltons and institutional investors means that they need to constantly increase profits---I'm surprised the last of the overseas operations weren't sold long ago---perhaps there simply weren't buyers. If the stores continue to stagnate (or worse decline) and they manage to at least keep most of their customer base online, they will be where Sears was when they phased out the catalog, except the positions will be switched--stores as the problem, mail order as the growth area. Except phasing out stores is more difficult---some could become fulfillment centers but they wouldn't need all that square footage. Some would close. But who will want the space? Retail is overbuilt in the US. Big box retail is saturated and some sectors, like Toys have vanished. They'd also have to figure out what to do with Sam's which has a few good quarters recently but has basically been a failure for years. Costco might want a few; some might work for order fulfillment, but otherwise that's a lot of dead real estate. the future for Walmart is not bright--they're highly centralized merchandising model and their dislike of addressing people skills pretty much will continue to to box them in.

Wal Mart shines in rural areas and medium sized markets. Lower cost structures, less competition (both for customers and employees), seems to be where they do best. Their stores in larger metro areas (if they get a full size store in) seem to be kind of out of controL (granted they are always VERY high volume), attract an element of crime and are not a very good shopping experience.

Target continues to have limited appeal to many consumers when you are in the lower middle class income range which seems to be a primary customer for Wal Mart. Plus Target simply does not have the SKU assortment of Wal Mart. In my market in a ~60 mile radius we have 2 high volume full size Target Stores, 1 low volume full size Target Store, and 11 Wal Mart Supercenters (2 rural ones I would describe as medium volume, the others are all very high volume operations). I am expecting a 4th Target shortly which would be a small format that would do well in a tourist area, but we will see if it materializes. If Target tried to put 11 stores up in this market, they would saturate and fail due to too limited of an offering. While I agree Target's formula works better for someone in an urban area who lives in an apartment and wants to buy "home decor" items and "trendy" looking products, when you get out into the rest of the US with the home owning and land-holding pick-up truck customer, Wal Mart is much more successful and has a more broad appeal.

As far as International goes, at least Wal Mart has some success Internationally. Canada and Mexico seem to be solid. China is expanding. Target- they flopped hard in Canada. Completely clueless.

Wal Mart's days of super growth are probably behind them, but that doesn't mean they can't continue to be a cash cow for years to come. As long as they don't screw up the Supercenters, which are their primary means of being a "cash cow." Sears- really screwed up. Focused on the wrong things. Sears burned numerous customers with bad experiences on major purchases like appliances, etc. or repair issues after the purchase. Also consumers had many options other than Sears. The Wal Mart purchase is a lot less serious and is not likely to have the "burn factor" of a Sears major appliance purchase gone wrong. There are not many other "Supercenters" than Wal Mart. Kroger was really showing promise but they seem to be blowing it hard. Meijer expands very slowly. Target has quit building Super Targets (which is too bad and something I'd like to see them revisit- but Super Target was a less effective format than Super Kmart was- they were just not effective with Supercenters- terrible fresh departments and very low sales per square foot).

Over the years many competitors have grown by taking advantage of the ignorance of others. Look at how Publix cleaned up in the South at the expense of lousy operators like A&P and Winn Dixie. Out west look at how Safeway capitalized on failures of Albertsons in the late 90's, then Kroger got a leg up on both of them in the later 00's as both Safeway and Albertsons ran into serious problems. Kroger also capitalized nicely on problems with Wal Mart in the later 00's and early 10's. This does not seem to be a method that creates sustained growth though...

[veteran+]

"Over the years many competitors have grown by taking advantage of the ignorance of others. Look at how Publix cleaned up in the South at the expense of lousy operators like A&P and Winn Dixie. Out west look at how Safeway capitalized on failures of Albertsons in the late 90's, then Kroger got a leg up on both of them in the later 00's as both Safeway and Albertsons ran into serious problems. Kroger also capitalized nicely on problems with Wal Mart in the later 00's and early 10's. This does not seem to be a method that creates sustained growth though..."

Yes, but as Florida continued to destroy Unions those union shops disappeared. Publix quickly took over while Winn Dixie fell asleep and the Grendel Walmart awoke!

[veteran+]

I agree that they are winning.

Meanwhile employees continue to lose.

Competition continues to lose (some of it their own fault).

Consumers continue to lose for HUGE reasons they cannot fathom, long term.

Peoples from other nations continue to be exploited so Americans can enjoy low prices (long term.........low prices are not free).

I am afraid the employees have already lost. Grocery is no longer a career job for a clerk just starting out except in a few unique circumstances (rural area, or maybe as a butcher). Between the two-tier union agreements which are so bad for the employee, now you have the Wal Mart starting wage dollars above the union starting wages at grocers in a number of markets, and various other watering down of the union contracts, the employees have lost.

I also fail to see any difference in how Wal Mart sources its products vs. Target and various other retailers who sell similar items... people from other nations are being exploited so Americans can enjoy low prices and also so American corporations can earn big profits. The pandemic should have taught us something about this but as I look at my imported mask, we hear about imported vaccines, and I will just stop now and say I don't think it did.

Degrees of separation not worthy of equipollence.

There is no comparing Walmart's malfeasance to Target's (or any other retailer), not by any measure.

I agree that that inane two tier agreement was an abomination. The watering down effect is not exclusive to retail. Hollywood suffers as well with this untoward trend.

[storewanderer]

Degrees of separation not worthy of equipollence.

There is no comparing Walmart's malfeasance to Target's (or any other retailer), not by any measure.

Why though? Because they are bigger? Because they were more aggressive with suppliers on the front end at pushing them to get costs down?

In the end these retailers are all doing the exact same thing... Wal Mart may move a lot of general merchandise but if you combine what these other retailers (Target, all of the department stores, etc.) are moving of general merchandise imported from overseas countries with very low labor rates, the others are moving more product as a group in total, than Wal Mart moves. So who is really doing more exploiting, in total?

Not saying it is good (it isn't) but it seems to be "industry standard." To the point that even if someone wants to make stuff in the USA it is very difficult because the infrastructure for so much manufacturing has literally been torn down. Again- this is not good.

I haven't checked Wal Mart's Christmas yet to see if they have any non-consumable Made in USA items this year. Last year they had some gift wrap (not all of the gift wrap, only some), gift bags, tissue paper, paper cups, paper plates, and a few other random items Made in USA (in previous years all of this stuff was Made elsewhere- about the only Made in USA item you saw in seasonal was the plastic storage totes). I thought this was interesting even if only 5% of their seasonal mix (if that). At Target ALL of those items have been made overseas in previous years- I don't think they have any non-consumable seasonal item that is Made in USA (maybe the plastic storage totes). Also bought some sandals in summer 2019 at Wal Mart that were Made in USA (this year's version of the same sandals were no longer Made in USA... forget where they were made... was disappointed with that).

So even if it is hardly any product, Wal Mart did buy that Christmas stuff, those sandals in 2019, from some USA supplier. Items that were previously not from a USA supplier. That created some USA jobs. Can you cite any items or categories where Target did that? I would like to know- because I have not seen it at Target, and I would certainly consider buying the items if they are there.

I did buy some 2 for $1 Christmas Cards at Dollar Tree last night from the loose rack on the card aisle in some sub-Hallmark brand that were marked as Made in USA. This is an improvement as a number of greeting cards I've seen lately are made elsewhere. There were Christmas Cards elsewhere in the store that were not Made in USA.

[veteran+]

I am not debating that other retailers are engaged in the same activity, because they are.

I am talking about the degree and magnitude of Walmart's practices.

No retailer on the planet has been brought to court worldwide as often for crimes against workers than Walmart.

Also their pernicious activities with suppliers and competitors (beyond fair competition practices) is well known. Perhaps Amazon will usurp Walmart's reputation.

[TW-Upstate NY]

The race to the bottom has more than its share of participants unfortunately.

[storewanderer]

Checked Wal Mart tonight. Vast majority of Christmas Wrap is Made in USA this year. Same with the Christmas Tissue Paper, the Christmas paper plates, Christmas paper cups, Christmas paper tablecloths, bags of bows... way more wrap Made in USA this year than last year. I would say at this point possibly 10% of the seasonal section is Made in USA given the presence of these items. Also noted gift wrap in Hallmark and Pioneer Woman brands Made in USA as well.

10% is a small number, but certainly better than 0%...

What Made in USA items are in the Target Christmas area?