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| Subject: Walmart's CEO is retiring. Can You Afford To Retire? | |
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Author: Dennis S. Vogel |
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Date Posted: 16:55:38 01/13/09 Tue What I wrote below is blunt because I want you to take these issues seriously. I want people & their businesses to thrive. If you're not a retailer, you can extrapolate & use what I wrote in your situation. It seems like too many small business owners retired (going through the motions), but still work in their businesses. Long-term survival requires commitment, not just going through the motions. I wrote this post in response to "Wal-Mart's Scott Delivers Swansong Speech at NRF" http://www.retailwire.com/Discussions/Sngl_Discussion.cfm/13479 I realize it’s been more than a decade since I wore a Wal-Mart/Walmart vest (except in occasional nightmares). Walmart has changed somewhat positively. I noticed amoral in some posts here. Amoral has various connotations & denotations. The connotations tend to lean toward immoral. Amoral can mean (denotations) ethically indifferent, morally ignorant, neutral in principles & without standards. Retailing & retailers shouldn’t be ethically indifferent, morally ignorant or without standards. Neutrality in principles is OK to a point, if it means a retailer doesn’t discriminate in favor of a moral code & against another moral code. In public, Walmart has standards, whether those standards are practiced internally is questionable. Walmart executives have been almost executed for accepting gifts from suppliers & potential suppliers. I advise suppliers & potential suppliers to save money on gifts. That money will be needed later after Walmart squeezes suppliers’ profits. Scott talked about partnerships. But I doubt supplier relations with Walmart are even close to partnerships (there may be some exceptions). Is Walmart fair? Probably, Walmart screws everybody who’s vulnerable. Retailers have a hard time competing with Walmart when suppliers need to get their profits from other (non-Walmart) accounts. When Walmart plays poker & pushes millions of chips to the table center, who else can match it? You can safely BET most of those chips were rung out of suppliers’ pockets. Many small retailers have superior poker hands, but they can’t outlast or match Walmart’s betting & bluffing. Even a royal flush isn’t enough to keep small retailers from getting flushed. The answer? Don’t play poker or any other game with Walmart. Play totally different games or parallel games. Example: Green issues & practices are very important & popular. For Walmart, green means a lot more than just the environment. Even if Walmart executives & a few investors wanted to do things that didn’t improve Walmart’s profits, I’m sure most investors would vote against those practices. Reducing packaging waste, logistical innovation & reducing energy use are good for the environment, but Walmart would do those anyway. How ecologically sound is the production of products Walmart sells? Sure, foreign production is less expensive. A big reason for the reduced costs is lax or nonexistent environmental standards. The worst of the pollution is apt to happen in places Americans wouldn’t find or dare to go. Some is very apparent though, remember the Chinese communists suspending manufacturing before the 2008 Olympics? It was to reduce pollution before the world focused on Beijing & the surrounding area. After Toto pulled the curtain away from the Wizard of Oz, the Wizard commanded the visitors to pay no attention to the man behind the curtain. Walmart is as transparent as coal & its secrecy rules will keep it that way. You can safely bet its secrecy isn’t all to protect trade secrets. It’s mostly to keep dark secrets. Small retailers individually (possibly not even collectively) can match Walmart financially, but they can do some things to show they’re willing to sacrifice to save the environment. I don’t have space to elaborate, but I’m sure retailers could check some of Walmart’s green practices, then develop ways to do what’s better without any apparent profit motive. Small retailers can understand customers on a micro level which big retailers (especially giants) can’t. Even with its billions of dollars & billions more from suppliers, Walmart can’t afford to know customers on a micro level. It has to act on a macro level. Small retailers can probably deeply understand their inventory since they offer fewer products. Walmart can’t afford to give employees the kind of knowledge a specialty retailer has. Walmart probably knows how to manage the business in much more detail more than any small retailer. But it doesn’t have to be that way. Working on a business shouldn’t just be occasional. It shouldn’t be a cliché either. Walmart has people working on its business every business day. Small retailers need at least 1 person working on their businesses every business day. If they don’t, they won’t compete. Survival yesterday & today doesn’t guarantee survival tomorrow. If a small business isn’t thriving, it won’t be surviving for long. Some people are the lack of 1 paycheck away poverty. Too many businesses are 1 recession away from failure. Those who survive recessions are financially weakened to the point of failure & can’t afford to withstand any problems. Don’t be a Red Queen who runs as fast as possible just to stay in the same place. Since competitors keep moving forward, you may stay in place, but you’ll lose your place in the race. Get out of that rat race, because only rats can win a rat race. Work on your business & find a new way to compete in a different race. Dennis S. Vogel thrivingbusiness@email.com If you’re not offering the right value, you’re helping competitors, not yourself. You need more information & methods to help you help more customers. Help yourself to that information & those methods by using these URLs. http://www.voy.com/31049/ http://www.lakefield.net/~thrivingbusiness/ [ Next Thread | Previous Thread | Next Message | Previous Message ] |
| Subject | Author | Date |
| Dennis, Don’t Gloat You’re Not The Only Walmart watch dog | GRand Master (To Be Announced) | 17:11:53 01/17/09 Sat |
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