RAH-RAH-ZISS-BOOM-BAH...

...the wonders of shopping Wally-World in This Corporate Age...

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On PBS tonite, a program about Wal-Mart aired. And it showed clips of a shareholders' meeting that looked like a cross between a rock concert and "Let's Make A Deal". I learned that there are 250 Wal-Marts (and counting) in China, would you believe. And how the bosses of Wal-Mart suppliers in China are trained to "fudge" overtime stats and employee numbers, should someone actually come in and Check Up on How things Are Going. Also shown on the program were the "rah-rah" sessions with employees..."Wal-Mart is good...Wal-Mart is good..." Well, not exactly like that, but store managers lead cheers and the ever-faithful ground-level clerks are encouraged to yell back and wave their arms in blind devotion to The Company. (Which is why I could never work in such an environment; I'm not a "rah-rah" type of person.) By the way, they're actually not "clerks", they're 'sales associates'. Other stores call 'em "team members".

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There's just something strange about when a company refers to its employees as 'Associates' or 'Team Members'. Both terms, in my view, imply that Employees not only work, but adopt the corporate mentality, selling a piece of themselves to The Company. I'm sure that Wal-Mart, like every other 'team-oriented' business in the country has provided their workers with Employee Handbooks. An 'Employee Handbook' is actually a multi-page document that lists all the ways you can possibly lose your job. So if one commits an on-the-job infraction, and they didn't know they'd violated policy, they can be told, "Well, it's listed in the Employee Handbook. You did read it, didn't you?" Read it or not, you're Out The Door, bounced out like a rubber ball made in China for Wal-Mart. There are so many issues with Wal-Mart; forcing suppliers to almost go out of business if they, the suppliers, don't cut their prices in order to meet Wal-Mart's needs, plus all the low-wage issues with employees, er, their 'sales associates'. Rah-Rah-Ziss-Boom-Bah...

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I go into the local Wal-Mart several times a year, although the times I visit Wally-World
can safely be tallied on One Hand. There are those who will never go into a Wal-Mart for various reasons, and I used to be one of them. Largely, I still am. I do 90% of my grocery shopping at a McKay's market which has several franchises around my area in Southwest Oregon. Occasionally I go into the local Albertson's, which, while being a larger regional retailer, isn't as imposing or mega-megalomanic as Wal-Mart, which is everywhere. I get all of my prescriptions at the local Bi-Mart, a southern-Oregon chain, and I'm paying about what I'd pay at Wal-Mart. I do feel really good about buying at local businesses. So I make a conscious effort to do that.

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When I end up going to a Wal-Mart, I try to rationalize my behavior, and with Wal-Mart, well, I look at it this way: Local People Work There, so my buying there will contribute (in a very meager way) to local wages. That's what I tell myself. So I'm going to be needing new bi-focals in this year. What if Wal-Mart's prices are lower than everyone else's? I mean, it's my Vision Health, after all. There are Vision-Care Specialists at Wal-Mart. Someday they'll probably have Brain-Surgeons too (scary!). And, yeah, I've bought some CD's there, and it's not like Chinese workers making 10 cents an hour are packing those, right? (Maybe the CD companies have their own slave labor somewhere else, who knows?) So sometimes I'll go there to find that One CD I've always wanted, or to check their prices on Blank Music-CD prices. (Yep, there's a difference between blank Music CD's and regular blank CD's.) But I usually hold off; every now and then Bi-Mart marks down a pack of 50 to $9.99. And dare I say that's lower than I've ever seen in a Wal-Mart.

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I bought a $9.99 wrist-watch at Wal-Mart a couple of years ago. I really like the color of Gold, and it was just a nice-looking watch, so I got it. It had a ten-year battery, after all. Plus Gold Numbers, a gold casing, and a silver-and-gold watchband. Not Real Gold, obviously. If I ever go shopping for a Real Gold watch, it might as well have the name "Rolex" on the dial. Anyway, the gold on the watchband of the Wal-Mart watch wore out after a year. And the wrist-band only lasted two years. I'd inverted the watch band so I could read the fine print on the watch casing, and, "SNAP"!!! It's like having a broken shoelace. It renders the entire shoe (and its mate) useless until you get new shoestrings. And if you only install one shoelace, you've got an extra shoelace laying around that you'll probably never use. (Damn, it's easy for me to get "off topic", huh?)

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So I bought a replacement watchband for my Wal-Mart watch, assuming it would fit. I was in another store which had cheap watchbands for sale; I found a gold-tinted band, and took it home. I didn't have the watch with me...I didn't know I'd find watchbands on sale either. And guess what: it didn't fit! Well, it turns out that my Wal-Mart watch has a smaller area in which to insert the pins, and as a result, the "end"clasp of each band WOULDN'T FIT in the watch! I thot all these things were universal; guess not. Obviously, Wal-Mart would prefer I bought another watch from them. Sheesh. Can't you see me walking into a jewelry store, spending big bucks on a wristband to fit my $9.99 watch? So now I'm stuck with this nice-looking watch that I can't find a band for. And there are still 8 years left on my ten-year-battery. I'd hate to have to throw away a good watch! In the meantime, I went to Bi-Mart, looking for a reasonably-priced watch which possessed some quality, and laid down $40 for a Timex Watch with the Indiglo feature which lets me tell time in the dark. And it's a handsome watch. Gold numbers, and even a gold Second-Hand. Cool!

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The thought just struck me...here's what I can do...I can wait for the ten-year-battery to expire, and if that happens before a decade has passed, I can take my watch back to Wal-Mart for an exchange! New watch AND a new band. I'll have to think about this...

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One of the few other times I go to Wal-Mart is to visit their Automotive Center to get my oil changed, although there are plenty of other places down here to get that done, and I'm tempted to go elsewhere, just because Wal-Mart is Wal-Mart. But you know how Wal-Mart Super-Centers have so many other businesses located in the stores' confines? Our Wal-Mart down here has a McDonald's located On Premises. And what all of those other business are hoping, is that because someone is shopping for 'Whatever' in Wal-Mart, Joe Customer will also drop some of his hard-earned $$$ at Their Business Too. So yeah, I went to McDonald's, while waiting for my car to get serviced. I got an ice cream cone and a root-beer. Nope, not a float. I eat the cone, then drink the root beer. "That's one ice-cream cone with a root-beer chaser!!!" So McDonald's tagged me for about 3 bucks and change. Me, the big spender.

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You can tell that the "Bi-Mart" chain chose that name YEARS ago. It's obvious that the "Bi" was a pun on the word "BUY". And all I'll say about that is, wow, some word meanings sure change over the years, don't they?