Wal-Mart Good or Bad?

Wal Mart is very bad for a lot of people. They treat thier workers like crap and they are destroying small towns around the world by putting the local businesses out of business and taking over. They are causing a lot of damage.

i also agree that walmart prices can sometimes be higher. and plus i don't like going to the walmart by my house because its always so full of people. when you are trying to shop there's too many people and you just get more frustrated. i rarely ever go to walmart and if i do its usually because someone else wants to. i cant even remeber the last thing i bought from there.

I have started to not shop at Wal-mart when I can avoid it. It takes money away from small businesses. Of course, they are going to have some items that are more expensive than they would be at other stores. All stores take losses on some items to get customers into the store so they will spend money on some of the items that they make a profit off of. Here, it is hard not to buy things at Wal-mart somtimes as I live in a rural area and sometimes places don't carry what I want at an affordable price or they are closed at an inconvenient time.

Unfortunately, I live in a rural area in Florida and have only two choices for purchasing groceries...U-Save and Wal-Mart. I buy some things at U-Save which is closer, but I save money by purchasing other items at Wal-Mart. We only have one other option when it comes to clothes, too...that would be Bealls, a closeout store. Unless we want to drive for an hour or more to one of the larger areas that surround us, this is our situation.

We don't have Wal-Mart in Australia, but we have Kmart - which is probably the same sort of thing. I think we get conned, because we pop in for something and then imagine we need a whole lot of other stuff. By the time you get to the checkout, it's surprising how things have added up and you get quite a large bill for a lot of junk you didn't have on your list! I think they are great for books, though - our Kmart has them for nearly half the price of the bookshops, and I'm happy to pay $19-$22 instead of $35-$45.

I generally like shopping at walmart, but lately of noticed the prices in my areas walmart have gone up and not just a little but a lot and I think its getting really ridiculous how much they are starting to charge for things, I mean stuff that should cost $4.50 now cost $5.50 example I was reasontly shopping at walmart to buy a few things like tooth paste and mouth was so I go over to where they sell there hygiene stuff and I want to grab a small bottle of mouth was I forget how many ounces but anyway it was small enough to fit in a medium suite case and it cost $3.79 instead of $2.49 and I thought to myself what for this small bottle and on top of that they dont even have lay away anymore, I dont use lay away that often but I think walmart should keep that option available to its costumers, I wonder why they would take out lay away? whats up with that.

I am not sure about the exportation of money.. i usually dont get involved in things that i ahve no control over but I do know that every now and then walmart has good deals... and other times they double the price of things that other places sell for half as cheap.. I think alot of places do that... I go to walmart, winndixie , publix, dollar store, and sometimes freds... I notice that they all do a good job at selling good deals but they switchit up so much..you relaly have to do alot of shopping around..

I would be a little more agreeable to your argument if we didn't have the ability to shop in other places. That is your own responsibility to find your better prices. Also, bear in mind how many items they carry. Again, it is up to you to check price, quality etc. I shop at Walmart all the time, but not just Walmart. There are things at our dollar store that is a better deal. If I am looking for a higher ticket item, I shop around, this is when quality means more. The deals you get or don't get are up to you.

First, Walmart is the least expensive place to buy most any item. If you find an item at another store that is not on sale and cost less then what it does at Walmart, all you have to do is bring that to Walmart's attention and they will meet or beat that costs. Also, I compare prices of most everything that I buy at different stores all the time and most of the time, Walmart already has the lowest price, so your first claim is false. "Another way Wal-Mart is hurting us is most of the stuff they sell is a cheaper quality imported stuff. It doesn’t last as long as it should and most doesn’t do as good a job as it should. This means we must replace the items more often which winds up costing us more money than if we paid a little more for quality stuff." Hmmm...again I would have to disagree. I buy many things from Walmart and I do not see this problem. Most all of my clothes are bought from Walmart. They last me for years and years without wearing out! My husband buys tools from Walmart, again, he has had all of his tools for years and they are still in excellent condition even though he uses them often. I buy most of my kid's toys from Walmart, and those toys are also still in good shape, even the ones that they have had for a long time. I have an instant camera that I bought from Walmart four years ago that I still use and it still works great. I have cookware sets from Walmart that were bought ten years ago that are still in excellent condition even though I use them almost every day!...I could go on and on. I have always gotten good quality merchandise from Walmart so I see that claim as simply a matter of your opinion, but not fact. As for your last claim, many, many, many American businesses import things from all over the world. If we boycotted all of them, you would most likely hurt the American economy even more. You point out that by Walmart importing from other countries that it costs us jobs, well, Walmart also employs thousands of people!!! If Walmart and every other business in America that imports things from other countries was boycotted and went out of business, that would put hundreds of thousands of Americans who work in those places out of a job as well!

Just because of one little price difference you can't go and say that Wal-Mart is bad. Doesn't matter where you go prices are always going to be different. I have gone to places where things were cheaper than WalMart and sometimes Walmart has been the cheapest. The key here is shop around before you buy. I thought alot of consumers already knew that. Another thing with cheap garments. I have never had a problem with any clothing articles that I have bought there to buying somewhere else. Maybe you just go through your cloths faster than I do but I have never had a problem other than the normal wear and tear that happens with every article of clothing. So I am for Walmart as I have nothing bad to say about them. I actually do like them.

I remember when Wal-Mart's marketing strategy was that they sold goods made in America. Well that went by the wayside a long time ago. Now they drive their vendors out of business with the demands they place on them. So they are harmful in many ways. Additionally, it is well documented that they are unfair to their employees; low wages, no insurance, etc. I am glad to see Target becoming a real threat to Wal-Mart. I think the reason for the threat is that people want affordability but they also want quality. Target's inventory is a better quality in my opinion.

another bad thing they make a ghost town out f downtown in small towns like where i live. they put all the mom & pop stoures out of buisness. anything new that comes into town goes to the edge of town where wal-mart is because there's more traffic out that way. there are hardly any buisnesses left in what use to be downtown.

Hello, I wrote an article about this topic titled Big Box Superstores. Since I don't have enough posts to paste I will write out the link and you can copy it or whatever you can do with it. www.associatedcontent.com/user/342726/faye.html This is my content page, feel free to read any of it and leave me comments, the article I am talking about is about 6th from the bottom.

As far as quality of products is concerned, I can't say that I have had any more problems with their products then I have with items purchased elsewhere. Walmart is pretty much my one-stop shop, but I can't say that I like it. I live in a very rural area and as it is, I have to drive 20 minutes to get there. If I want to go somewhere else, I have to drive another 30 minutes. It's just not worth it. A quick comment on how they treat their employees. I have actually worked there for a very short period of time and I can honestly say that, at least where I was, we didn't have any problems. They actually have an open door policy which means that you don't have to go to the hierarchy. You can go straight to the store manager with your problem if you want. And I know it's not just "a pretty speech" it's actually true. I have done it. As far as importing goods, I guess I would tend to agree with you, but I think at this point, the whole trend is pretty much irreversible. We live in a global economy and we will have to somehow find the way to make it work. It is not going away. I think it is a bit utopic to think that you can have a closed market. There are certain products that we have gotten used to having that are simply not available here. Not everything can be replaced by a synthetic version of the real thing.

I used to boycott Walmart. Actually the first time I set foot into one of their stores was in Germany when my place of employment sent me there for 6 months. It was the only big store in the neighbourhood where we lived. I hear in the meantime Walmart has pulled out of Germany because the employees did not buy into the Walmart philosophy and culture. In Canada in the Province of Quebec the Walmart stores also closed because the unions were getting a foothold and also because the employees opposed the Walmart culture. Quebec is the French speaking part of Canada. There are a few Walmart stores here where I live but I still dislike them, especially the poor old greeters. It puts me off as soon as I am approached by them. The point that you raise about exporting the manufacture of goods to other countries is well taken, but I think in North America and Europe we have priced ourselves right out of the market. Most companies now farm out the manufacture of goods to China, India, Thailand and other countries. Some people work for 1 dollar per hour, we could not compete with those wages. But we are to blame in part if we get shoddy merchandise and poisoned food and toys. We want ever cheaper goods and squeeze the companies overseas to produce them so they resort to very dangerous practices. If we were not so greedy and materialistic we could afford to buy goods manufactured at home where people could work and earn a decent living. In the community where I live there is a strong movement going to shop locally for produce, toys and clothes. These goods often cost twice as much as those in Walmart and other Big Box Stores so it means you buy less. Christmas gifts is a good example. Instead of a mountain of toys manufactured by underpaid workers in a foreign country I will get my granddaughter one quality toy. By the time she opens all the presents from the other grandparents, parents, aunts and uncles she will still have a lot. Maybe her parents will put some of the stuff away so she does not get greedy.

Sounds like you had a bad experience with Walmart. Walmart is the store I shop at the most. The employees have always been very helpful and I get good bargains. They are quality merchandise and I love shopping in their grocery store. For me I like Walmart although there are other stores I do shop at on occasion.

It is good when you are catching their sales.. But it is bad, when you are over spending, on something that you don't need. Or when you spend all your money up, and then have nothing left to spare for other things that you may need it for. It is good for the holidays, when you are catching sales of the sales paper..

I guess Wal Mart wants to make the most of their reputation. Everyone thinks that shopping at Wal Mart can save a lot of money. Too bad they don't live up to that anymore. Perhaps some of the items at Wal Mart are cheaper though? We don't have Wal Mart on my country and I've never been to one. But I'd still like to check it out when I see it. Thanks for the heads up!

Sorry to hear you don't like walmart but i just love it.It is my one stop shop.I can get just about everything i need in the store.I like their products and i really think the prices are resonable compared to other department stores.I buy the majority of my clothes there as well.

There are only very few supermarkets here in my place. And the cheapest I guess is walmart. Well some of their stuff. But I wont go to another supermarket if there is only like .05 cents difference. So most of the time I would end up purhcasing everything in walmart. Plus the fact, that they have almost of the stuff that I need. the only thing i wouldnt buy from there maybe are elctronics. The store has a very linient policies for returns. So I wont buy those stuff.