Wal-Mart's PR win
Lewis DiuguidAmerica’s biggest retailer and largest private employer has taken big public relations steps to win over the hearts and minds of more consumers.
To prove that it is a good corporate citizen, Wal-Mart with stores around the world is reaching out to hire more than 100,000 veterans in the next five years.
That should help push down the disproportionately high unemployment rate of those who have served in the military. But to also help boost the U.S. economy, Wal-Mart officials said the Arkansas-based company will spend $50 billion to buy more American-made goods in the next 10 years, The Associated Press reports.
Also to boost its image, the company plans to help its part-time workers move into full-time jobs more quickly. Wal-Mart has long taken heat over its low-pay, part-time workforce.
The changes represent good PR moves by the retailer.
Mark Hastert
5 months agoGood for Wal-Mart! Employ Americans. Buying more American goods for their stores to sell will increase that American employment. Wal-Mart jobs aren’t the greatest pay but food on the table and a roof over the heads of a Vet’s family are a Godsend. They offer health insurance and they’re going green in many of their stores too.
Phil Cardarella
5 months agoOK, good for them, even if the motive is PR.
BUT… Let us NOT lose track. Wal-mart’s stores carry about 80-90% imports in everything but the food aisle. And their practices drive down wages in the US — and would have been in violation of anti-trust laws before Reagan.
Oddly enough, lots of things can be made cheaper where there are no environmental laws and where labor relations consist of putting a bullet in the back of the head of the union organizer — and then selling his organs to the highest bidder.
Yes, you probably will save a few bucks shopping there. You can then use them to help support your brother when he loses his job — or your neighbor when his kid is sick.
In reality, stuff you buy at Wal-mart is the most expensive stuff you can buy.
George Hunsucker
Northland
5 months agoOK phillie, I will bite….
” And their practices drive down wages in the US — and would have been in violation of anti-trust laws before Reagan.”
What SPECIFC THINGS are you referring to here? Remember, SPECIFIC, not just some lib throwaway line phillie…..
Kent Mueller
5 months agoObviously Lewis has a huge hatred for Walmart. His phraseology sure shows that, along with his repeatedly saying that what Walmart does is for “PR”.
Interestingly, I have never,ever, never, ever, never, ever, or at any other time heard Lewis say that Obama has done anything for PR purposes. But evidently, that is what Walmart does.
Lewis, are you laughing at anyone who might have thought that your blog was a serious discussion?
And Phil, your “few bucks” is such an old and tired line. Walmart saves hundreds of dollars per year per household wherever they are located. If what you say is true, then you must believe the vast majority of America is utterly stupid for shopping there, and you are the smart one. Really,what are the odds of that?
George Hunsucker
Northland
5 months agoum, still waiting for all these UNCONSTITUTIONAL PRACTICES that Wal-Mart practices.
Did the local barrister perhaps have a bout of legalistic hyperbole??????????
Phil Cardarella
5 months agoSorry, I took off time to have a life.
Up until 1981 (when William French Smith, Reagan’s Attorney General Designate was fixing anti-trust cases in a White House basement office even before he was confirmed)certain pruchasing and marketing practices of the Great Atlantic and Pacific Tea Company — A&P — had been litigated and found to violate the anti-trust laws.
One was the way they used their buying power as the largest retailer to force price concessions from suppliers — which had the result of reducing the wages of those employed by the suppliers, but that was not the primary issue.
The issue was that — when, like A & P then and Walmart moreso now — a corporation so dominates the market that you can use that to create an unfair advantage over your competitors. Anti-trust does (did) not require actual monopoly, but only such size as to dominate and dictate the market.
Please bear in mind that anti-trust laws are meant to encourage competition. They are PRO capitalist as well as pro-consumer. Left unregulated, corporatations are quite Darwinian: The strong will devour the weak until only one or two are left to dominate.
Much like banking today, such corporations not only become too big to allow to fail but too big to regulate by law. We regularly lock up individuals that launder drug money or violate embargos to terrorist groups like Al Qaida , Hamas or Iran’s Revolutionary Guard. Not the big bank, who pays a fine (equal to $2000 for the average guy) and goes scot free.
There is a point at which BIG IS BAD.
George Hunsucker
Northland
5 months agoYou said UNCONSTITUTIONAL phillie…. What is Wal-Mart doing that in your mind used to be UNCONSTITUTIONAL????
Merely driving a low price from a supplier is not such a thing, which you know….
Keep trying, when you have the time phillie…