Abstract

Retailing is at an interesting crossroads nowadays. Retail sales, on the one hand, are at their highest point in history whereas numerous challenges are faced by retailers on the other hand. Many consumers do not have much time for shopping or they are bored with it. There are many stores in some locales, and retailers often urge one another into frequent price cutting (and low profit margins). Therefore, retail management strategy is very much important. In this paper, the retail strategy of Wal- Mart is discussed, as in terms of sales, Wal-Mart is the leading company in the world— ahead of General Motors, ExxonMobil, and other manufacturing giants.

Table of Contents

Introduction3

Discussion and Analysis3

History of the Company3

Retail Stores of Wal-Mart5

Merchandise Assortment5

Pricing6

Human Resources7

Communication Mix8

Store Layout9

Customer Service10

Competitive Advantage12

Conclusion13

Works Cited14

Appendix15

Retail Management Strategy

Introduction

Retailing includes the business activities engaged in selling services and goods to consumers for their individual, household or family use. Every sale to the final consumer can be included in retailing (ranging from apparel to cars to meals at restaurants), but normally those businesses are more considered to be under the umbrella of retailing that sell “merchandise generally without transformation, while rendering services incidental to the sale of merchandise”. All the activities are involved in retailing that are used to sell services and goods to final consumers directly for personal non- business use.

In the United States, among the 25 largest businesses, three (Wal-Mart, The Home Depot, and Target) are retailers. Big retailers, outside the United States, encompass Tesco in the UK, Carrefour in France, Daiei in Japan and Metro in Germany. (Roy, p. 1372) In this paper, the retailing strategy of Wal-Mart will be discussed. History of the company, its retail strategy, human resources, pricing strategy, communication mix, and store layout and customer services offered by the company will also discussed in this paper. Wal-Mart is chosen as business in retailing sector.

Discussion and Analysis

I interviewed Rodney Jacobs, who is Market Manager at Wal-Mart.

History of the Company

Wal-Mart was founded in 1962 by Sam Walton in Rogers, Arkansas. Walton pursued a budget retail strategy from the outset, sourcing from only the cheapest suppliers and locating Wal-Mart stores outside regional centers. Wal-Mart's organizational culture bore the mark of its founder and its rural origins. Wal-Mart praised small-town and (to some degree) Christian values, including loyalty, hard work, conformity, and patriotism, and it maintained a gendered division of labor such that most service-oriented employees were women while most managers and executives were men. Although it has changed significantly since its establishment (Dowty & Egan, p. 511-13), Wal-Mart continues to reflect important features of its early beginnings.

Over the past fifty years, Wal-Mart has grown rapidly such that it now employs upward of 2 million people across the world in 8,692 stores. Were it a national economy, Wal-Mart would be roughly the size of Sweden (though growing at a faster rate), and it would be one of China's leading trade partners. While discussion about Wal-Mart 's growth continues, business analysts generally suggest three factors as crucial to its ...