Don Soderquist

From a capitalist standpoint, Wal-Mart is one of the greatest stories ever told. With a ruthless penchant for efficiency and low prices, Wal-Mart arguably has made the biggest impact for the average person. Is it a good or a bad impact?

This is a story told by the retired Vice Chairman and Operating Officer, Don Soderquist. He began with Sam Walton in 1980 and watched the growth of Wal-Mart rise to be the largest retailer in the world. In the light of all the recent bad publicity of Wal-Mart, it was difficult to accept everything Don said.

I do know it’s difficult to please everybody. How do you please a company of 1.6 million associates? When you have a company that size, is it really possible to pause to look at each person as a person? With a company that size, how can you have knowledge of what’s happening on the front lines? Wal-Mart’s technological prowess is legendary but even it can’t find an answer to stop the anti Wal-Mart detractors.

I think that a lot of the problems are rooted in the fact that Wal-Mart is the biggest dog in the retail world. When the first punches are thrown at the (perceived?) bully, all the other beta dogs gang up, bark and bite as well.

Some of the biggest complaints that I want to address here.

Wal-Mart offers slave labor wages to its associates.
There is a rumor that Wal-Mart is educating their associates on how to use welfare to supplement their income. I don’t know if there’s a way to verify this. Wal-Mart however does post their information about wages and health insurance. On their website, Wal-Mart gives an average of hourly wages of associates. What is the average wage scale of other retailers? Wal-Mart posts that 59% of their associates are insured and people complain that Wal-Mart isn’t doing enough. However, in all the detractors, I have never heard of the percentage of associates that other companies and more importantly retailers insure.

Wal-Mart destroys small businesses when they enter the market.
If Wal-Mart is doing their job well, they are taking a larger piece of the retailer pie and would take a lion’s share when they join a market. Yes, many small businesses owners will struggle or under – incidentally, maybe have to join Wal-Mart and get a pay cut. This is the nature of capitalism and I would have a bigger problem with government subsidy to keep an inferior business afloat.

The bottom line is that there are a lot of people who hate Wal-Mart, but obviously there are many more people who love to shop Wal-Mart. People do have choices on where to shop. If you don’t like Wal-Mart, shop somewhere else.

What does Wal-Mart mean to you? I have the strange paradox of being a shareholder of the company but I rarely set my foot into Wal-Mart. From an investor standpoint, I think it’s a great story and an amazing story. However, from a consumer standpoint, I would like to have more of a community store. It would be nice to go to a store where everyone knows your name and the money you spend is helping directly helping little Billy save up for his first car. Wal-Mart feels so impersonal to me but it’s what people obviously want.… (més)