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The Wal-Mart Effect: How the World's Most Powerful Company Really Works--and How It's Transforming the American Economy
written by Charles Fishman
Studio : Penguin (Non-Classics)
by Penguin (Non-Classics)
Publisher : Penguin (Non-Classics)
Released : 2006-12-26
Availability : Usually ships in 1-2 business days
Number of Items : 1
EAN : 9780143038788
Avg. Customer Rating: (based on 113 reviews)
List Price : $15.00
Our Price : $5.00
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ISBN13: 9780143038788
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Condition: NEW
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Notes: Brand New from Publisher. No Remainder Mark.
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Product Description |
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Wal-Mart isn’t just the world’s biggest company, it is probably the world’s most written-about. But no book until this one has managed to penetrate its wall of silence or go beyond the usual polemics to analyze its actual effects on its customers, workers, and suppliers. Drawing on unprecedented interviews with former Wal-Mart executives and a wealth of staggering data (e.g., Americans spend $36 million an hour at Wal-Mart stores, and in 2004 its growth alone was bigger than the total revenue of 469 of the Fortune 500), The Wal-Mart Effect is an intimate look at a business that is dramatically reshaping our lives. |
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Wal-Mart, the store we love to hate |
Fishman shines a harsh light on the mega-retailer, then focuses the reflected beam through a prism revealing subtle shades of influence that you probably haven't considered.
Fishman's cool-headed assesment peels Wal-Mart apart like the proverbial onion, revealing its influence - good and bad - on our global economy and local community. While we generally think that we understand how Wal-Mart shapes consumers, Fishman shows how consumers reshape Wal-Mart on a daily basis. An objective reader might even finish the book with a begrudging admiration of the heartless Wal-Mart beast. |
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More bad news for Bentonville... |
If you are one of the population who loves Wal-Mart, keep your blinders on and stop here. Personally, I hate Wal-Mart. I hate what it has done to American manufacturing, I hate that it stupidly mistakes lower quality for lower prices, I hate waiting 15 minutes to check out because only 3 of the 300ish checkout lines have an actual employee present. I go there as little as possible, and only when compelled by a spouse/kid/parent/etc.
Given my feelings for Wal-Mart, it is no surprise I read this book. Fishman comes across as fair and objective in his coverage of issues such as health insurance for Wal-Mart employees, off-shoring of American jobs, Wal-Mart's real impact on mom-and-pop businesses, Wal-Mart's muscling their suppliers, and many others. Fishman is fair, and to his credit does much to dispel my belief that Wal-Mart is malicious and evil (I ignored those parts, my wife informs me I am an expert at selective listening). Love it or hate it, no one can ignore Wal-Mart at this point. |
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This work was an eye-opener, a page-turner and one you will not forget any time soon! |
She was only sixteen years old. Her job was to sew pocket flaps on the back of pants and her quota was 120 pairs an hour. Sometimes Robina Akther failed in her job, a job that only paid 13 cents an hour. Her pay was so low despite working seven days a week that she couldn't even afford a toothbrush. It was a time of despair because when she failed to meet her quota she was beaten in the face . . . with the pants she was making for Wal-Mart. Are you wearing those pants?
Wal-Mart is a colossus, one that has changed the face of our economy, one that has changed the lives of many across the globe. Some people are Wally World fans and take their entire families off to peruse those 60,000 'every day low prices.' It is indeed a family outing. For others, as Charles Fishman says in his newly revised edition of THE WAL-MART EFFECT: How the World's Most Powerful company Really Works-and How It's Transforming the American Economy, that smiley face can have another meaning altogether.
In one interview conducted by the author, Sherrie Ford states "When you see the Wal-mart smiley face, whistling and knocking down prices, somewhere there's a factory worker being kicked in the stomach." Wal-mart, a company who now may now cast the evil eye at Fishman, has been exposed on many levels as a company that has apparently not taken a course on ethics 101. A few tidbits the author has to offer the reader:
* Wal-Mart shifts the cost of low prices to its suppliers in order to save themselves a few pennies
* Wal-Mart forces companies to out source labor resulting in massive loss of jobs
* 20,000 families have been plunged into poverty as a direct result of the arrival of Wal-Mart stores
* There are dead zones in the ocean because of Wal-Mart's $4.84 salmon fillet
* Wal-Mart is the number one grocer in the world
Charles Fishman is a passionate individual, a man who doesn't mince words when it comes to researching and writing about Wal-Mart. Like many people, I think little about obtaining items at low, low prices and the ultimate consequence to people and companies behind the things I purchase. This work was an eye-opener, a page-turner and one I will not forget any time soon. This is one book I can almost guarantee you will not see on the shelves of Wal-mart at their every day low prices so you'd better pick up a copy right here and now. Besides, you wouldn't want to get run over by a cart while someone is in a hurry check out those cheap pants and put someone else out of a job.
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Very well researched book |
Wal-Mart is a company that is either loved or hated. Those who bought the stock when it went public and held on to it did extremely well. Those who had to compete against this giant did not do so well. I liked how this book not only portrayed the company's successful tactics, but also the negative ones that it has on our economy and small businesses.
- Mariusz Skonieczny, author of Why Are We So Clueless about the Stock Market? Learn how to invest your money, how to pick stocks, and how to make money in the stock market |
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Surprisingly Shallow and Lacking in Research and Analysis |
When I purchased this book, I was eager to learn many things that
I didn't previously know about WalMart and its effects on the world.
It is a shame that the author either didn't bother to do in-depth
and critical analysis of the issues on stake or didn't have
the balls to criticize one of the most powerful corporations in the world.
Obviously, the author emphasizes the "Always Low Price" philosophy of Walmart
so much. Well, duh. Who doesn't know that if you are even slightly aware of
the corporation's policy? And who doesn't know about alleged exploitation
of its employees and foreign workers to produce cheap stuff? He just wasted
whole lot of spaces writing about things that people already know.
It really makes me wonder why the author didn't dig deeper into the exploitation and problems
surrounding Walmart. The world knows about it, so what's the point of
hiding it? And he also gives the implication that the overall Walmart effect
is inconclusive just because there isn't much standard academic research
being done on the topic. Anecdotal and observation evidence are good enough.
He does manage to squeeze his final thought on the very last section of the last
chapter. Of course, for a corporation that is as large and powerful as Walmart
it exerts huge influence on both consumers, suppliers, economics, and culture.
And however much benefit the consumers seem to enjoy from being able to buy
lots of good for cheap price, it is being so becoming so clear that it helped fuel
the unsustainable growth of consumption economy (70% of GDP) and causing all sorts
of problems such as monopsony, bankruptcies of competitors and suppliers, and
unfair practice of labor law, and encouragement of over-consumption and over-production.
Additionally the way the author wrote about Sam Walton really makes
me wonder if he was really the man the author paints him out to be. A generous and hard
working man who loved him employees and who couldn't have possibly foreseen what his
creation was going to become within two decades from his death. I don't see much evidence
for that weak claim.
Overall, not enough in-depth research, too much use of anecdotal evidence, repetitive messages
about that ever-so obvious philosophy and benefit of "lower price," all contribute to
resulting in an additional unsatisfactory work. |
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