Walmart may be the largest retailer in the nation, but being the largest won’t do it any good when we find that they are lacking grossly in customer service, price, and quality.
I read a piece in the Times online tonight that touched base on how Walmart is rolling back their Rollbacks .. evidently, having the “lowest prices” isn’t doing Walmart any good at all in helping to stabilize their bottom line.
Walmart, I feel, has grown so much, so fast, over the years, that it has lost it’s grip on quality. These days, with the economy in the toilet, we find shoppers looking for quality wares .. wares that might last a while longer.
Walmart can raise their prices all they want, but it might not do them any good as long as they insist on selling can openers that will only last long enough to open maybe two or three cans. I mean, C’mon .. a one dollar item is just that .. A one dollar item. If that can opener had the true price of just one dollar, like it should have had .. I never would have purchased it, and I could have saved both Walmart and myself the trouble, by purchasing a quality can opener at a different store.
Selling the cheap China knock-offs for a higher price may indeed be the undoing of Walmart altogether. Walmart .. Dollar Store products with a Sears/Macy’s/JC Penny price tag isn’t going to work.
Customer service? .. Walmart doesn’t pay it’s help enough money per hour for them to really even care if you can find a product or not. One store will tell you they have the desired item over the phone .. and when you arrive at that store, you discover that they really didn’t have the product or item after all.
The Walmart stores in the Pacific Northwest (Washington, Idaho, Montana) do a better job on their customer service, but the Walmart stores I’ve shopped at here in Southeast Texas are an epic fail. These people down here seemingly just don’t give a tinkers dam about anyone who walks into their store ..
The only complaint I might find with regard to the Walmart stores in the Pacific Northwest, is that they are stocked continuously with clothes that some one in the south might wear .. Different geographical regions of this country have different tastes, styles and needs .. it’s too bad that Walmart, for as large as they are, still hasn’t figured this out .. one size (XXL), style, color .. in this case .. absolutely does not fit all.
The Walmart stores in the north are seemingly stocked with a variety of fish products, whereas the Walmart stores here in the south are not.
The Walmart greeters in the north are seemingly very friendly .. they won’t sneer at you or make inappropriate comments directed at you when you are having a bad day, like the Walmart greeters in the south will.
The Walmart meat, in both the north and the south, when cooked, tastes nearly the same as the packages they came out of .. Walmart meat is yet another epic fail.
I’ll refer to the article I read in the Times online when I comment on Walmart’s infamous “Action (clutter) Alleys” .. I understand the impulse shopping angle in this case .. but what about the shoppers themselves .. shopping carts that would choose to steer to the perpetual left from being hit by cars all day out in the parking lot, loaded with items, kids, or in most cases, both — trying to navigate the insanely narrow space that these so-called “Action (clutter) Alleys” create. Trust me when I say that your Walmart shoppers are spending more time trying to navigate the narrow alleys than they are even attempting to see how much the clutter costs that stands in their way.
Wide open spaces are a good thing, but Walmart doesn’t seem to think so .. let’s fill our shopping corridors up with even more of those cheap China products in an effort to increase our bottom line. Let’s ruin the moral of our employees by paying them a wage that requires them to have a welfare supplement.
Walmart .. you are not Sears, Macy’s, or JC Penny .. you are the late night infomercial .. the “As Seen On TV” guy .. the “ShamWOW Guy” .. the epitome of Chinese superiority in the retail market in this nation.
The only way that Walmart is ever going to make it beyond this recession, is to start selling some quality .. no .. corporate pep rallies aren’t going to get it done for you.
Arguing over a posted price for a product at checkout, can openers that only last a day or two, toasters that heat but won’t toast .. the list is longer than my arm ..
This blog post may be written off as just a rant by the many .. after all, I’m just one guy .. one guy that’s shopped at Rosauers, Buttery’s, Safeway, Albertsons, Fred Meyer, Tidymans, HEB, Kroger, and so on. I’ve also shopped at Walmart stores from Seattle, Washington, all the way down to Beaumont, Texas.
Walmart receives a failing grade in these three areas .. Customer Service, Quality, Price .. and depending on where in the west you are shopping .. these three fails will occur and may not appear in the exact order listed here.
