Contour Enthusiasts Group Archives Forums General Common Interests whats the deal with hating walmart?

all of the normal(read non elitist) people i know like walmart because of all the stuff you can get there at a good price. the elitist i know hate walmart claiming that it is destroying business and one person even said destroying america, the dolt. one city(inglewood i think, but don't quote me on that) even voted against allowing walmart to put a store in their city because of the "damage", whatever that means, it would do to the city. so what is the story?

for the record, i have no problem with walmart.

I don't hate Wal-Mart for coming in and ruining communities. After all, it is the citizens of a community that actually shop there. I remember seeing a special on public TV or Discovery or some similar channel that showed a town go through the process of getting a Wal-Mart. I believe it was a small town in Arkansas. As usual, the mom-and-pop stores complained, as did other people. But they were lured by Wal-Mart's promise to pay for several roads the town desperately needed, so they agreed to allow Wal-Mart to build there. Within the first week that Wal-Mart was open, almost everyone that complained and actually petitioned to not have them there was in the store shopping. The power is in the people, not the companies. If the entire town and other surrounding communities had not shopped there, Wal-Mart wouldn't be there for too long.

Having said that, I understand Wal-Mart acts quite egregiously and often illegally at a corporate level. JaTo once talked about this, and maybe he will do so again. A lot of people hate Wal-Mart for coming into communities and putting all the small stores out of business. I find it difficult to hate them for that, because if I was a business entity I'd be trying to do the same thing. It's the illegal and unethical practices that make me quite suspicious of them.

I go to Walmart all the time. just there last night. a lot of people despise Walmart because they are known for going to towns and putting small businesses, and big, out of business due to their undercutting prices. They have practically wiped out entire towns. i mean seriously though, like 20-30 mom and pop stores in a small town. this has given them monopolistic control in many areas, and even in other countries now. I wouldnt be suprised if in another 10 years or so they are being scrutinized for anti-trust like Microsoft was.

they are also iron-fisted with the companies they deal with. they make incredible demands on their suppliers and threaten to drop them if they dont comply. being the largest retailer in the world, the companies are forced to comply.

the state of CA is upset with them because they do not provide the majority of their employees with health benefits which then makes the state pay for them. they say that a company this large should be able to provide health benefits to its workers, hence the recent proposition on election day. (that was aimed specifically at Walmart).

i think there is also a stigma that only white trash people shop there but the Walmart near my house is in one of THE nicest areas in the Valley.

I think Target is a good competitor to them. they care many things Walmart does not, suprisingly. I cant believe Kmart is still around. Kmart is like a bad cold that just wont go away.

For me:
-70% of Wal-mart's imports come from China, which considering how much stuff is imported kind of scares me.
-Some of the factories that make stuff for Wal-Mart, in China, use prison labor.
-To me people's buying power (increased) by shopping at Wal-Mart is offset by the jobs lost. The vast majority of the people who shop there are lower and middle class (which is most of America anyway). A lot of these people have hurt themselves because their jobs get shipped overseas due to the stuff that they buy at Wal-Mart.
-If you buy something from Joe's hardware store on Main St, Joe gets the profit on the products he sells. So then he might get Bob the carpenter to put an addition on their house; thus the money stays in the community. With Wal-Mart it goes to Bentonville, AR, and 5 of the 10 richest people in the US (IIRC, Walton's are 5 of the 10).

I don't know enough to get into their HR issues in this country, but there have been many. I generally try to avoid shopping there, but sometimes it is inevitable. I have tried cutting down on my trips to Sam's Club as well.

i started this thread in the attempt to cure my ignorance on the subject, so don't think that i am defending them. also i want clarify that the people i called elitist are not so because they hate walmart but because they happen to be.

Originally posted by Davo:

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It's the illegal and unethical practices that make me quite suspicious of them.

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i would love to know more about this.

http://www.fastcompany.com/magazine/77/walmart.html

My dad despises Walmart. His reasoning is that they state that their products are made in the USA when they aren't

I personally couldn't care less. I actually worked for Walmart this year in one of their Distribution Centers. Pretty good money with benefits, only I hated my life everyday I went in at 4am to walk into a 33 degree building, with occassional trips into the -10 and -20 degree freezer to pull orders. I don't miss that job!

Mark