In August 2008, Wal-Mart Stores announced that its profit rose
\n17 percent in the second quarter and that it is raising its
\nfull-year forecast. In a challenging economy, the world’s largest
\nretailer benefited from low prices and its moves to cut costs.
\nWal-Mart’s President and Chief Executive Lee Scott said that,
\n“While inflation and higher fuel costs are pressuring suppliers,
\nretailers and customers worldwide, we’re confident that Wal-Mart is
\nwell positioned for this economy.” Chief Financial Officer Torn
\nSchoewe attributed the better second-quarter profits to tighter
\ninventory controls, which led to fewer markdowns on merchandise.
\nOne of Wal-Mart’s goals \u2014 which it successfully met \u2014 was keeping
\ninventory growth at half the rate of its sales growth which it
\nsuccessfully met. In contrast, sales at department stores and
\nspecialty retailers were lagging behind. What is the key to such
\ngood results? Wal-Mart overhauled its strategy. Instead of
\nannouncing any price increases to cope with the tough economy, the
\ncompany slashed its expansion plans. It refocused on lower prices,
\nimproved the mix of merchandise offered, cleaned up its stores and
\nprovided friendlier and faster customer service. But there is more
\nto Wal-Mart’s success over the years than just tighter inventory
\ncontrols and lower prices. Wal-Mart is truly a great company. A
\nstrong organizational culture is the foundation for making a good
\ncompany a great one. The secret to Wal-Mart’s success has long been
\nattributed to its strop culture. Analysts like Jim Collins believe
\nthat W al-Mart had the kind of ‘cult-like’ culture that is shared
\nby all great companies. +Wal-Mart employees are referred to as
\n`Walmartians’ which is a sign of a unique culture shared by them.
\nThis culture is responsible for a company of this magnitude to be
\nable to sustain its entrepreneurial spirit decade after decade.
\nSince its early days, Wal-Mart achieved remarkable growth rates and
\nwas the first trillion dollar company in the world.)1n 1999,
\nWal-Mart became the largest private employer in the US with
\n1,140,000 Associates. But with amazing success also came
\ncriticism.&al-Mart was sued many times and even held the record
\nfor being sued the maximum at one time. Its practices and culture
\nwere held responsible for killing small local retailers. It was
\nalso criticized for gender-based discrimination, its overtime
\npolicies and using sweatshop products<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
In August 2008, Wal-Mart Stores announced that its profit rose
\n17 percent in the second quarter and that it is raising its
\nfull-year forecast. In a challenging economy, the world’s largest
\nretailer benefited from low prices and its moves to cut costs.
\nWal-Mart’s President and <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-110274","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-economics"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/essayparlour.com\/custom-essays\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/110274","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/essayparlour.com\/custom-essays\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/essayparlour.com\/custom-essays\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/essayparlour.com\/custom-essays\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/essayparlour.com\/custom-essays\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=110274"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/essayparlour.com\/custom-essays\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/110274\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":110275,"href":"https:\/\/essayparlour.com\/custom-essays\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/110274\/revisions\/110275"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/essayparlour.com\/custom-essays\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=110274"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/essayparlour.com\/custom-essays\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=110274"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/essayparlour.com\/custom-essays\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=110274"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}