Synthesis Exam
Wal-Mart
It is said that Wal-Mart will build its new supercenter in Jackson Country in the Carbondale-Murphysboro area. Although there is a Wal-Mart supercenter in Carbondale, Wal-Mart wants to expand its market in the surrounding area, so the situation above happens. Of course, it will bring extra benefits to Wal-Mart.

We should think that it is very good for most customers.

We should know how it will benefit local people. There are some features of Wal-Mart old stores; I think that will occur in its new store. First, Wal-Mart sells for less. It is the first choice for low- income families. Locke said, “Wal-Mart is especially popular among low-income shoppers who cannot afford the prices of the more upscale stores” (2004, par. 4). Second, Wal-Mart is huge big-box, so the customers can find almost everything in Wal-Mart. It is convenient and saves us lots of time. Third, the employees of Wal-Mart are patient and warm to everyone. There is a sign of the support desk saying “Can I help you?” which makes the customers comfortable.

We should consider that Wal-Mart’s quality of goods and services as “one of the most impressive success stories in history of business” (Locke, 2004, par. 2). Wal-Mart makes its goods clean, so the majority of its goods are fresh. On the other hand, some small shops sell some of these goods that are going bad. The new supercenter coming means more and more people can eat fresh food. Wal-Mart offers delivery service; when the new supercenter gets closed, the fee for delivery will go down, and the speed of it will be faster for locals. Wal-Mart creates some brands of its own. For example, equate vitamins, has been the “USA’s top sellers” (USA TODAY, 2003, par. 3).

We should imagine that the new Wal-Mart supercenter would raise the local economy. It would bring more job opportunities to locals as it used to. “Wal-Mart created 125,000 U.S jobs, and is continuously adding thousands each month” (Hoenig, 2004, par. 16). The employees of its new supercenter will pay the tax to increase the local economy. It is said that Wal-Mart and its employees have “pay million of taxes” (Hoenig, 2004). In addition, the new supercenter would increase the income of government. The customers who shop at the new Wal-Mart supercenter should pay the taxes either by cash or by card. Some small shops ask the customers to only pay cash to avoid paying taxes.

Wal-Mart never stops working to supply quality goods and services to people, making customers happy and benefiting the local economy. Why do we not welcome Wal-Mart new super center? But, everything has both sides. In the future, we can do research to see the disadvantage of expanding of Wal-Mart.

Reference

Hoenig, J. (2004, Feb. 10). Welcome Wal-Mart. Capitalism Magazine. Retrieved Feb.20, 2006, from http://www.capmag.com/article.asp?ID=4561

Hopkins, J. (2003, Jan. 29). Wal-Mart's influence grows. USA TODAY. Money. Retrieved Feb.20, 2006, from http://www.usatoday.com/money/industries/retail/2003-01-28-walmartnation_x.htm

Locke, E. (2004, Feb. 22). Three Cheers for Wal-Mart. Capitalism Magazine. Retrieved Feb.20, 2006, from http://www.capmag.com/article.asp?ID=3534

Research Paper

Wal-Mart and small business

Abstract

Wal-Mart is one of the biggest retailers of American. It sells groceries in its super center. Recently, Wal-Mart went in to small business. It opened new supercenters in small towns. More and more people who usually shop at small shops went to Wal-Mart. Soon, thousands of small businessmen were out of jobs. We should take three strategies to keep small shops existing.


Wal-Mart is the largest retailer in America. Now it is trying to carry a full line of groceries along with clothing and other goods usually found in its supercenter (Kaiser, 2003). It sells the same goods as those in small shops and has taken a lot of customers from them. Wal-Mart has huge capital to support its development. After Wal-Mart came into small business, thousands of small businessmen ran out of business. For instance, Bonnie Neisious, a small businesswoman who owned a UPS franchise in Las Vegas, said that “surrounding businesses” that were near her shop folded and “her business was down 45 percent”(Goldman, A. & Cleeland, N. , 2003). The motto “We Sell for less” is very attractive; the small shop cannot match its price. “Wal-Mart is well liked”, said Larry Peterson (Kaiser, 2003, par. 4). It means that the public has recognized Wal-Mart and it is easy for Wal-Mart to get its position at the expense of small shops. If we do nothing about this, the small shops will be closed and thousands of people who work in this area cannot receive their income.

Although Wal-Mart has lots of advantages of going into small business, we also can do something to help the small business to accept the challenge of Wal-Mart. We should take three strategies to keep small shops existing.

We should use the government to stop Wal-Mart from going into small business. First, we get make the local businessmen to start an organization and complain about the situation about Wal-Mart to the government. Second, they should make the government know the damage to the local economy and ask them to pass a law to help them. Third, they should ask the government to create some small business support center to give them some ideas of raising their ability to accept the challenge of big-boxes.

Small businessmen need to join together to start an organization. “The trend of mega-mergers and huge chains is wiping out small business everywhere” (Lippman, 2004, par. 3). Wal-Mart affects small business anywhere, not only a few towns. It is powerful, so they should start an organization. The members of the organization can be “neighbors, clergy, educators, union members, retirees, former public officials, small business owners, etc.”(Norman, n.d.). We should think that there are several things that the small businessmen can report to the government. “Only a company of their size can buy direct from manufacturers, cutting out the distributor. They buy so cheaply they can resell to other stores at cheaper than wholesale. Thus they can ruin the competition through predatory pricing” (lippman, 2004, par. 2). Because Wal-Mart cut out the supplying of manufacturer, the small shops do not have a chance to exist. They have to buy goods from Wal-Mart. But Wal-Mart will raise the price. When the small shops sell the items, they have to make the price higher in order to get the benefits. As a result, so person wants to go shopping in a small shop.

The damage of the local economy is obvious. Wal-Mart “put their money in big banks, taking it far out of town” (Lippman, 2004, par. 5). When it takes money out of a town, the money of the town will be reduced. So the town will be lack of capital.

In addition, we should get the support of local residents. We can tell them the bad results of shopping at Wal-Mart. First, if the majority of residents only went to shop at Wal-Mart, the small businessmen would lose their jobs. Then the number of unemployed will rise, which means many families will live in a poverty state. They will not even have money to buy foods and necessary goods. Furthermore, many small businessmen will have to take a job in Wal-Mart, and then they will have little salary and be without adequate health care. They must take two or more part time jobs to earn a living. Finally, if there were only one shop, Wal-Mart, in the groceries area, could charge any price it wants. And locals would not have choices.

If the Wal-Mart appeared in towns and communities that wanted Wal-Mart, people might only shop at Wal-Mart. Wal-Mart “never talks about the jobs” it “destroys”(Norman, n.d.). Many small businessmen would lose their jobs.

The local citizens should notices that Wal-Mart is not willing to give its employees enough heather care. “Wal-Mart’s Health Care Plan Fails to Cover Over 600,000 Employees. Wal-Mart reports that its health insurance only covers 48% of their employees. Wal-Mart has approximately 1.3 million US employees” (United Food and Commercial Workers International Union, 2005, par. 9). Many of the local workers of Wal-Mart do not have health care. Maybe some of the workers are the local’s relatives. If the workers were seriously sick, they could not afford the cost of seeing the doctors.

If the local small shops were closed, many of small businessmen would have to work for Wal-Mart. That means that with the salaries that they earn from Wal-Mart that cannot afford their families. “In 2001, the average pay of a Wal-Mart worker was $8.23 per hour, more than two dollars less per hour than the average supermarket employee wage of $10.35 per hour. Wal-Mart wages are so low that the average Wal-Mart worker’s annual salary in 2001 was almost $1,000 below the federal poverty line of $14,630 for a family of three” (Cram, n.d., par. 3).

If the two steps above are not practiced, we should help small businessmen change themselves. First, they can stock the goods that Wal-Mart cannot offer. For example, they can offer high-end goods or have a special shop only for certain people. Second, they can offer delivery service. Wal-Mart only offers delivery service on limited goods. If they offer delivery for all the goods under the requirement, many people will be willing to come to small stores. In the end, small businessmen can choose their goods from the Internet to find the lowest price to reduce the cost.

It would be good if the small shop offered good quality and services.”You can not compete with Wal-Mart on price…So you need to find a niche and have different product lines, services and retail goods that are not in competition” (Ronna, 2003, par. 7).

These above are three ways to accept the challenging from Wal-Mart. It is said that Wal-Mart is interested in fashionable dress and plans to purchase some medium brand like Tommy. This is obviously against its usual rule. Will it get benefits or not? This is another topic, which will be covered later.

Bibliography

Goldman, A.& Cleeland, N. (2003). An Empire Built on Bargains Remakes the Working World. Los Angeles Times. Retrieved Feb. 15, 2006 from
http://www.pulitzer.org/year/2004/national-reporting/works/walmart1.html

Cram,J.(n.d.).Ten things that Wal-Mart don't want you know.
Campus Progress. Retrieved Mar. 1, 2006 from
http://www.campusprogress.org/features/279/ten-things-wal-mart-doesnt-want-you-to-know

Kaiser, E. (2003). Some Cities Resisting Wal-Mart Expansion. Common Dreams News Center. Retrieved Feb. 15, 2006 from

http://www.commondreams.orgheadlines03/0712-06.htm

Kruchak, M. (2006). Proposed Small-Market Wal-Mart Good for
Kindersley: Merchants. Retrieved Feb. 15, 2006 from
http://web.lexis-nexis.com

Lippman, D. (2004). Let's take about why I heat Wal-Mart.
Retrieved Feb.28, 2006 from
http://www.davelippman.com/walmart/whyihatewalmart.html

Norman, J. (n.d.). Eight Ways to beat Wal-Mart. Retrieved
Mar.1, 2006 from http://laplaza.org/~totem/eightways.html

Norman, J. (n.d.). Community First: Strategy Basics. Retrieved mar.1,
2006 from http://www.wakeupwalmart.com/community/strategy.html

Ronna, B. (2003). Friend of foe? How Wal-Mart will change urban Honolulu. Retrieved March.13, 2006 from
http://www.allbusiness.com/periodicals/article/639324-1.html

United Food and Commercial Workers International Union (2005). Wal-Mart Health Care. The real fact of Wal-Mart. Retrieved Mar. 1, 2006 from http://www.wakeupwalmart.com/facts/#healthcare

WGBH Educational Foundation. (2004). We Do Not Need Your Supercenter. Is Wal-Mart good for America? Retrieved Feb.28, 2006 from http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/us/copyright.html

Research Paper Proposal

Wal-Mart and Small Business

I am interested in Wal-Mart and small business because Wal-Marts are everywhere in America. Although Wal-Mart earns a lot of money, it is not satisfied with the income from groceries. It is trying to get into small business. After Wal-Mart moves in, the small businessmen go out of business. In an article in the Los Angeles Times (Goldman,A. & Cleeland,N., 2003), Bonnie Neisius, a small businesswoman who owned a UPS franchise in Las Vegas, said that surrounding businesses which were near her shop ran over and her business was down 45 percent because of Wal-Mart. Wal-Mart not only made them run out of businesses, but also got several thousands of Iowa businesses closed in ten years after it came according Dr.Stone’s study(1995). Dr.Stone is a professor retried from economy of Iowa State University. An author Mr.Kruchak published an article and mentioned the result of Dr.Stone’s study (Kruchak, 2006). Wal-Mart plans to open more stores to develop small business, which means the end of the small business.

I plan to write about three strategies that can help small businesses challenge Wal-Mart. If we did not do anything for small businesses, most of them would be closed. And thousands of small businessmen would be out of work. We must find some way to keep small business existing. First, we should think about how to restrict Wal-Mart by the government. Second, we should get small businessmen to change the methods by which they operate their stores. Finally, the small business can persuade local residents to avoid shopping in Wal-Mart.

I have found some background and the damages, which are related to Wal-Mart, and have discovered some articles on the Website. They should be helpful to solve the problems between Wal-Mart and small business. I need to continue to search for some useful options.

Reference

Goldman, A. & Cheeland, N. (2003). An Empire Built on Bargains Remarks the Working Work. Los Angeles times. Retrieved Feb. 15, 2006 from www.pulitzer.org/year/2004/national-reporting/works/walmart1.html

Kruchak, M. (2006). Propose Small-Market Wal-Mart good for Kindersley: Merchants. Retrieved on Feb.07, 2006 from http://web.lexis-nexis.com

Stone, K. (1995). Retail trade and community development, effects of mass merchandisers on other businesses. Retrieved on Mar.1, 2006 from http://www.econ.iastate.edu/faculty/stone/

S/R 2
One,Two,Three,Four…We Do not Want Your Superstore

A person on a public broadcast published an article named “We Do not Want Your Superstore”. In his article, the author thought that Wal-Mart destroyed small business. Recently, the retailers have been endangered by Wal-Mart. Wal-Mart attracted some of their customers.

Small businessmen wanted Wal-Mart to keep a distance from their areas. Because Wal-Mart would make most of them run out of business if there were a Wal-Mart superstore closed to them. The small businessmen’ wish actually is only a dream that cannot be reached. We should think that it is impossible for Wal-Mart stopping its steps on small business.

We should find that some new reflects that Wal-Mart brought in small business. It is said that Wal-Mart wanted to combine TOMMY to add its goods structure with fashionable dress. Wal-Mart want to sell not only bargains but also medium price goods. This means that some small businessmen who sell them will lose their job. Wal-Mart supplied eye-care and medicament. Wal-Mart’s coming will attract other “big-box” stores to come, such as Kroger, body and bathroom works and so on.

Wal-Mart has sorts of advantages that small business shops cannot match. It is a huge store and sells for less. Everybody likes bargains. It contains almost everything, so the customers do not have to go from one shop to another. So it is convenient and saves a lot of time. The quality of goods and services in Wal-Mart is better than that in other supercenters.

We think that the only way to let the small business to run is to let the government pay some money to help small business to keep their shops running. But it is only for a short time. There is no government to give money all the time. If the government passes an act, which protects the small business shops, they could survive. The market should be free in the end. If the market were free for big-box stores before the small business grew up, most of them would run out of business.

Wal-Mart is getting bigger and bigger. If the government did nothing about that, most of small business stores would be closed. Wal-Mart is not the only one, which can control the market. There are also some big-box stores also control the majority of their markets. In the future, we can do a research on what are the reflects that are brought from big-box stores.

Reference

Young,R.(2004, Nov. 16). One,Two,Three,four…We Do Not Want Your Superstore. Retrieved Jan.31, 2006 from http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/walmart/transform/protest.html