This is topic Wal-Mart did this in my town too in forum Books, Films, Food and Culture at Hatrack River Forum.


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Posted by Annie (Member # 295) on :
 
(story)

Despite local objections, they're proceeding with expansion plans.

They did this in my town, Bozeman, Montana, last year. First, they mailed out postcard "ballots" that they produced that consisted of choices like "YES! I want a Wal-Mart Supercenter to bring savings and selection to my town" versus "No thanks, I'm not interested in the shopping convenience a Wal-Mart supercenter would bring to my town." They won the "vote" and tried to present the results to the city council.

The city council laughed at them and told them the only way they were getting in was thorough a legitimate local vote. The city held the vote. Wal-Mart lost. Wal-Mart found a zoning loophole and a way to expand the store without city permission, and proceded to do so. That was when I swore never to set foot in their stores again.
 

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Posted by peterh (Member # 5208) on :
 
I haven't been in a Wally-world for over a year. My city (Chandler, AZ) is currently fighting a walmart neighborhood market at an intersection that already has 2 grocery stores.

Walmarts is the devil!
 

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Posted by pooka (Member # 5003) on :
 
Yeah, I also dislike Wal-Mart. Here they managed to get their construction funded by bonds in connection with a supposed historical landmark thingy.

[ April 08, 2004, 02:49 PM: Message edited by: pooka ]
 

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Posted by rivka (Member # 4859) on :
 


The threat of coming Walmarts directly led to L.A.'s 5-month supermarket strike.

I'm a bargain shopper, but I WILL NOT be stepping inside a Walmart (short of a major emergency).
 

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Posted by Xavier (Member # 405) on :
 
eh.

I find it hard to care.

We had walmart in Oswego and I saved probably over a thousand dollars buying things there over the years it was there.

It wasn't a superwalmart though, so very little amount of groceries in there.

The arguments against walmarts usually involve the loss of jobs at grocery stores.

We went over this in chat one night and me and Val decided I was a bit of a snob about this.

See, back home in upstate NY the people who worked at grocery stores were the exact same people who worked at walmart. Namely high school and college kids looking to make an extra buck. They weren't in it for their careers, these were crap jobs they did to pay rent and things while attempting to get a real job. You started at minimum wage.

Out here in SoCal its all unionized and those who bag groceries are complaining about not getting health insurance. My gut reaction is that of course you don't have health insurance, you freaking bag groceries. A trained monkey can do that. You are already getting 18 bucks an hour, which is about 3 times what you would be getting in NY.

But there were some very good reasons why the grocery workers should be getting benefits that were listed in chat.

Its still hard for me to care though. Working at a grocery store in upstate NY is the bottom of the food chain as far as jobs go, behind even burger king and other fast food.

So besides that reason, convince me why saving hundreds of dollars a year is a bad thing...

[ April 08, 2004, 02:57 PM: Message edited by: Xavier ]
 

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Posted by PSI Teleport (Member # 5545) on :
 

quote:

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My gut reaction is that of course you don't have health insurance, you freaking bag groceries. A trained monkey can do that.

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Mixed emotions on this one.
 

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Posted by Jenny Gardener (Member # 903) on :
 
I think big corporations are turning into Tyrants. Why does everyone drink Coke and soda without even thinking about it? Why aren't alternatives like milk considered by most people when they go to a McDonald's? Why do we feel fast-food restaurants are to blame for our problems with obesity? Do we turn over our thinking to CORPORATIONS? WHY? Why do kids clamor for the latest cartoon-related toy instead of running outside and making guns out of sticks?

I'm starting to hate American culture with a passion. Planned obsolescence, an economy based on buying buying buying, value based on market share.
 

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Posted by PSI Teleport (Member # 5545) on :
 
Because soda is delicious and addictive. *sips Dr. Pepper* Ahhhh, refreshing. I DO think about it.
 

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Posted by Jenny Gardener (Member # 903) on :
 
I'm feeling more and more that people and character are becoming cogs in the wheel to be manipulated for Profit. All hail Money, the God of our culture.
 

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Posted by Jon Boy (Member # 4284) on :
 
Don't say stuff like that with Google's spies watching, Jennie! Your stock is sure to dive.
 

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Posted by PSI Teleport (Member # 5545) on :
 
We Christians call that mammon.
 

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Posted by romanylass (Member # 6306) on :
 
I avoid Sprawl-Mart for much the same reasons, plus the sweatshop labor thing. (And before someone says that's unavoidable, I buy most of my clothes, appliances, books etc second hand so I don't give money to sweatshop using faceless corps.)
 

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Posted by Jenny Gardener (Member # 903) on :
 
Walmart = cheapness, plastic, planned obsolescence
Quality, things that last, are far from it. We don't care for our things anymore. We throw them out, because it's cheaper to replace them with new cheap things from Walmart (and other places). How many plastic toys will your children accumulate? How many times will you buy new dish sets or pots-n-pans or shoes? Will you buy new clothes EACH SEASON of EVERY YEAR? How wasteful!!! Watch the shelves fill with trash every season and tell me this is not something to mourn.
 

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Posted by Telperion the Silver (Member # 6074) on :
 
It's it ironic that it's the not the Government that's making life so hard. Like the evil credit rating system. We are doing it to ourselves...the Government isn't the one keeping us from getting loans or checking email at work... we are doing it to ourselves. Creating a new culture of corporate hierarchy and dictatorship.

Corporations are naturally dictatorships because they exist in a constant state of warfare with each other. That's why unions exist, to counter the totalitarian nature of the executives. Shame unions are getting more unpopular nowadays...

[ April 08, 2004, 03:14 PM: Message edited by: Telperion the Silver ]
 

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Posted by Sopwith (Member # 4640) on :
 
Sadly, there was once a time when Wal-Mart actually did have some worthwhile business practices. They offered almost exclusively American-made products except in items where there were no American manufacturers. They offered reasonably good products at good prices and then stood behind their products. They offered real service. And with that, they whipped K-Mart and a host of other retail stores, literally engulfing the market share.

Then, Sam Walton died and the company went to a more publicly-held stance. Today, they move in and basically rape the local business scene of small towns, undercutting prices and putting most of their inventory in at loss-leader prices until they've thinned the competition. Then, the prices creep back up a bit to their standard levels.

By that time, they have the local population ingrained as Walmarters who really don't have many options for other places to go.

And American products? Not likely unless they couldn't find it cheaper anywhere else in wholesale land. Customer service? Yeah... right? Stand behind their products? Sure, they'll make an exchange at the drop of a hat rather than try to figure out what went wrong with what you bought. Sure, you get another new item for the old one, but how cheap those items must be if it's more economical to replace them than to repair them, much less even look at them to see if you broke it or the item just broke itself.
 

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Posted by Ayelar (Member # 183) on :
 
And that, Xavier, is the real reason that cluefull people are against Walmart. It's not the fact that they're "stealing" jobs from other retail companies; they probably employ plenty of people. The problem is that they buy almost entirely from cheap overseas manufacturers, where stuff like employee wages, safety, environmental impact, and insurance aren't regulated the way they are in the US. American companies, even big ones like Levis, can't compete unless they also ship their jobs overseas where they can pay uninsured workers unfair wages.

So it's not the retail jobs that are the problem, it's every other kind of job. What field are you planning on going into? Unless it's something that physically requires your presence here in the US, like bussing tables or running a cashier, you should think about the impact shopping at Walmart will have on your line of work.
 

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Posted by BYuCnslr (Member # 1857) on :
 
why wal-mart sucks
Wal-mart is getting rather close to the type of conglomerate that was in Jennifer Government. Not only do they kill local businesses, but they treat their own employees horribly, even though they pay minimum wage, full-time employment is 35 hours a week, not 40. When an employee asks for more hours, it's rather likely that the employee is fired. Also, the non-supercenter walmarts have been known to lock employees in the store overnight. A very dangerous combination is when you have a Wal*mart with a Sam's Club right next to it...the only viable compeditor to that combination that I've seen is a Cosco at the next freeway exit...
Satyagraha

[edit] because I can't count

[ April 08, 2004, 04:49 PM: Message edited by: BYuCnslr ]
 

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Posted by Xavier (Member # 405) on :
 
Thank you Ayelar .

Reasons like these are what I was looking for.

Now my line of work right now is computer programming, and Walmart has nothing to do with that (that I know of). Well, unless they use software from India for their systems.

BUT

I still know that all sectors of the economy feed eachother. Especially in a field like mine, where demand pretty much depends on a booming economy. If the biggest retailer in america isn't selling american goods, that is bad for all (expept the Waltons apparently).

Well, not that I actually have a computer job, but when I do I mean .

[ April 08, 2004, 05:26 PM: Message edited by: Xavier ]
 

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Posted by Christy (Member # 4397) on :
 
The funny thing is that they did this here in Wisconsin (Stoughton, just a few miles outside Madison). The town took a vote and shot down the WalMart. WalMart said okay, we'll build it nearby and shutdown your little WalMart. Now all the sudden the town is raising all heck again to get the WalMart.
 

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Posted by AeroB1033 (Member # 6375) on :
 
I too avoid Wal-Mart like the plague. If I ever shop at a store of that type, it's Target, and even that's a very rare occurrence.
 

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Posted by sarcasticmuppet (Member # 5035) on :
 
Walmart doesn't have everything, people. It's quite possible, albeit probably not the easiest thing in the world, to maintain a competing business. All you have to do is adapt. I say this coming from Arkansas, the land of a thousand Walmarts, where time and time again I see lots adjacent to Walmart filling up with small businesses. Small businesses whose products even overlap those found at Walmart. They compete, and they compete well, because (once again) Walmart does not have everything.
 

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Posted by Rappin' Ronnie Reagan (Member # 5626) on :
 
When I first read this thread I was surprised that any moderately-sized city didn't already have a Super Wal*Mart. They're ubiquitous here. But then again I do live in the South. I have no doubt that Wal*Mart and the like harm small businesses. I can't even find any locally owned businesses to shop at instead of large national chains. I guess most of them disappeared before I started shopping. For example, there are no locally owned bookstores here. In a city of 200,000, people all the bookstores, except for used bookstores, are national chains. And it's because of Barnes and Noble and Borders.

Yes, small stores do pop up around Wal*Mart, but at least around here, they're all national chains too. I don't think there is a fight here anymore. Wal*Mart and friends have already won.

[ April 08, 2004, 07:14 PM: Message edited by: Rappin' Ronnie Reagan ]
 

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Posted by slacker (Member # 2559) on :
 

quote:

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Out here in SoCal its all unionized and those who bag groceries are complaining about not getting health insurance. My gut reaction is that of course you don't have health insurance, you freaking bag groceries. A trained monkey can do that. You are already getting 18 bucks an hour, which is about 3 times what you would be getting in NY.

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