Going Down The Wrong Aisle: Feminist Gives Hard Sell At Wal*Mart
AP reports: “Wal-Mart Stores Inc. used the stage of its annual shareholders meeting Friday to try to convince two divergent groups  the company’s social critics and Wall Street  that the world’s largest retailer is on the right path.”
Unfortunately, trying to please “social critics” is taking the company down the wrong path. But, alas, the genie is out.
“Company executives, between celebrity performances at the yearly cheering session, told of strict diversity goals but also said the company was working to change its stores to better meet the desires of female shoppers, who spend more time in the aisles than men. The company outlined different ways it plans to build on revenues that reached $288 billion last fiscal year.”
Two-hundred-eighty-eight BILLION dollars in revenues. You’d think they’re doing something right. But, dammit, how about those “strict diversity goals?” And don’t forget to “meet the desires” of women shoppers. If only Sam Walton were still alive…
“[CEO Lee] Scott drew two standing ovations during the meeting, but feminist leader Martha Burk was applauded, too.Shareholders and workers clapped when Burk, chairwoman of the National Council of Women’s Organizations, said Wal-Mart can do better than having only two women on its 14-member board. She was applauded again after her presentation of a shareholder resolution calling for a breakdown by race and gender of distribution of Wal-Mart stock options.
Distribution of stock according to race and gender? Sounds like communism is sleeping with feminism. Unbelievable. There will always be critics, and there’s no pleasing their desires.
In the end, just like everything, it all boils down to politics.
“A coalition of labor unions and others are spending $25 million to do whatever they have to do to damage this company,” Scott said, calling the effort one of the “most organized, most sophisticated” efforts ever mounted against a company.
Here’s the rub: Wal*Mart is a phenomenally successful and ever growing company, and it’s a model for the efficiencies of American capitalism.
By using superior retail technologies and leveraging their scale (which Sam Walton grew from a single store in 1945), the company is able to deliver competitive prices and enormous product selection to its customers. That’s why Wal*Mart is a giant of industry. A lot of people shop there. The company also happens to be non-union.
What difference does that make?
Just ask the airlines.
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