...Cross Cultural Perspectives: Wal-Mart ETH/ 316 June 11, 2012 Laura Brodkey-Scott Cross Cultural Perspectives: Wal-Mart Introduction Wal-Mart is defined as the giant of retail and it is one of the largest companies in the world. It has grown to not only be a staple in America but internationally as well, touching base in countries such as Japan and China. It is a popular supercenter that is located worldwide. Wal-Mart is the largest retailer and the largest company in the history of the world due to globalization and this due to the way they conduct business operations. Wal-Mart management has implement ways to overcome the challenges that are presented the ethical and social responsibilities in regards to globalization. This paper will present a breakdown analysis on how Wal-Mart has conquered the challenges of globalization and how they manager to remain the largest profit-making organization both in the USA and globally (Rosenfeld, 2007). In addition the paper will breakdown how the organization deals with ethical perspectives within this global icon known as Wal-Mart. Globalization Wal-Mart management embraced globalization and used it to develop a monopoly of international markets across the world. Wal-Mart has supercenters in the following countries: Mexico, Canada, Brazil, Japan, China and India. According to Glynn Davis (2008), Wal-Mart’s international market gives us a vast idea of the variety...
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...Wal-Mart’s E-Commerce Success Possibly the single greatest success story of e-business and B2B implementation is that of the rise to dominance by Wal-Mart in the North American retail market. Love them or hate them, you have to hand it to Wal-Mart for their impressive growth in such a short time span. And arguably the single most important factor in this rise was their harnessing of the power of e-business, e-procurement, and the adjustment of internal processes to maximize this advantage. So, why does Wal-Mart think e-business is important? Wal-Mart's focus on its e-commerce strategy not only allows the retailer to reach customers who don't have stores nearby, but, more importantly, the online customer is a significantly better customer than one that only shops at a store. “Wal-Mart believes eCommerce Brings Access to Customers Anytime, Anywhere (eCommerce 1)”. As customers not only do we expect to have great prices; we have grown to consumers who want products anytime no matter where we are. Can Wal-Mart successfully adapt their model online to challenge Amazon? While Wal-Mart’s total revenue is projected to be over five times greater than Amazon’s, the e-commerce return for Amazon’s all revenue is over seven times greater than Wal-Mart’s e-commerce revenue. Wal-Mart has gone as far as establishing Wal-Mart labs in California in order to prepare to challenge the online retail king, Amazon. These labs are designed to primarily compete against tech companies by taking...
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...Wal-Mart is a brand that is well known around the world, especially in the USA. Wal- Mart began in the USA in the state of Arkansas. It was founded by Sam Walton in 1962. Wal- Mart quickly became the largest retailer in the world. Defeating its competitors, Wal-Mart now has control and power of the U.S. retail industry and making huge gains as the top retailer in the world. Globalization was Wal-mart next step because of its retail dominance in the United States. Globalization efforts happened quickly despite the fact that many people were skeptical about Wal-Mart opportunities in the international marketplace. In the year 2006, over 40% of Wal- Mart stores were internationally located. Wal-Mart decided to target emerging markets as the starting point for international expansion in Europe, nations with growing populations in Latin America, and in Asia is targeted China. “The first international store was opened in Mexico City in the year 1991. By forming a joint venture with the Mexican retail conglomerate, Cifra, Wal- Mart was able to overcome cultural differences (Ball al 396).” After some experience with Mexican partners, Wal-Mart succeeded to expand further in Mexico, and entered Brazil and Argentina. Wal-Mart became one of the first international retailers in China. “In the year 2006, Wal-mart out bided its largest competitor in China and acquired Trust-Mart, a chain of over 100 super centers located in 20 cities in China (Ball al 396).” This acquisition...
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...Strategic Audit: Wal-Mart in Spain Debbie D. Stevenson Grantham University Wal-Mart in Spain Wal-Mart is currently ranked as the world’s number one retailers and the number one company in the world of sales (over $200 billion) on the fortune 200 lisr (www.wal-mart.com) (www.fortune.com) Wal-Mart Stores is one of the largest retail companies in the United States. Wal-Mart has four parts of their strategies that makes their mission possible. The four strategies that they use are: * Dominance in the Retail Market * Expansion in the United States and International Markets * Creation of Positive Brands and Company Recognition * Branch Out into New Sectors of Retails When Sam Walton opened his first Wal-Mart in 1962, he declared that three policies goals would define his business: respect for the individual, services to customer, and striving for excellence (www.walmart.com). Wal-Mart’s strategy for corporate management required selling high quality and brand name products at the lowest price (Vance, 119). In order to keep low prices, the company reduced costs by the use of advance electronic technology and warehousing. It also negotiates deals for merchandise directly from manufactures, elimination the middleman (Vance, 72. One of Wal-Mart key strategy is to dominate the competition retail market. Sam Walton, the company founder put in place a retail philosophy the company still believe and follows. Wal-Mart is a discount retailer because they sell their...
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...Understanding that there was not much differentiation of product in the retail industry, Wal-Mart founder Sam Walton aimed to achieve a competitive advantage by reducing costs at all levels, leading to lower prices for the consumer. Wal-Mart’s culture driven cost policy was and continues to be a valuable, inimitable and scarce resource that is embedded in the retailer’s routine activity. However, it is only through Wal-Mart’s technological innovations that the company is able to take full advantage of this unique resource. To be sure, Wal-Mart has “gained competitive advantages – despite the unattractive, high threat, low opportunity environments within which [it] operate[s]” (Barney, pg. 50). A closer look at the SWOT analysis, along with a rigorous breakdown of its internal value chain will help us understand how Wal-Mart, in only 40 years, has become the premier shop in its industry. Initially, Wal-Mart focused extensively on reducing costs, keeping wages and operating expenses down to bare minimums. Knowing these cost cutting efforts would follow Schumpeterian ideals and that competitors would eventually catch on, Wal-Mart strove for long-lived competitive advantages (Ricardian profits) and began to invest heavily in technology to help keep its costs below the industry average. To enhance operations, Wal-Mart developed “Retail Link” to provide its suppliers real-time computer access to point-of-sale data, helping to manage and coordinate the quantity and assortment of...
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...Wal-Mart de Mexico Note: Most of this material is adapted from David Barstow, “Vast Mexico Bribery Case Hushed Up by Wal-Mart After Top-Level Struggle,” New York Times, April 22, 2012. In September 2005, a senior Wal-Mart lawyer received an alarming e-mail from a former executive at the company’s largest foreign subsidiary, Wal-Mart de Mexico. In the e-mail and follow-up conversations, the former executive described how Wal-Mart de Mexico had orchestrated a campaign of bribery to win market dominance. In its rush to build stores, he said, the company had paid bribes to obtain permits in virtually every corner of the country. The former executive gave names, dates and bribe amounts. He knew so much, he explained, because for years he had been the lawyer in charge of obtaining construction permits for Wal-Mart de Mexico. Wal-Mart dispatched investigators to Mexico City, and within days they unearthed evidence of widespread bribery. They found a paper trail of hundreds of suspect payments totaling more than $24 million. They also found documents showing that Wal-Mart de Mexico’s top executives not only knew about the payments, but had taken steps to conceal them from Wal-Mart’s headquarters in Bentonville, Ark. Wal-Mart de Mexico was the company’s brightest success story, pitched to investors as a model for future growth. (Today, one in five Wal-Mart stores is in Mexico. Wal-Mart now employs 209,000 people in Mexico, making it the country’s largest private employer. ) ...
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...entRECHACHE Khaled Oualid EBS Paris Student Shanghai University Marketing Report Example of Wal-Mart Summary I.The Chinese Retail Market A. Analysis of the Chinese Retail Market B. A picture of China’s Retail Market : facts & figures II. Wal-Mart in China III. Wal-Mart suggested business model in China A. General Analysis B. Suggestions I. The Chinese Retail Market China is first of all a demographic power: 1 human being out of 5 is living there. It is a permanent member of the United Nations Security Council is in possession of the nuclear weapon and recently shoots down its own space satellites: this makes from it also a military power. As a matter of fact, China is replacing Japan as the diplomatic focus in Asia, and above all as the economic focus. Indeed, industrialized countries must take into account anew economic power and inevitable partner, all the more as it is a member of the World Trade Organization (WTO) since 2001. As a consequence, a good many foreign groups have decided to gain a foothold in the Chinese market, which is not an easy thing. We will firstly mention the opportunities and the obstacles which feature the Chinese retailing market. Secondly, we will try to establish a picture of this market, with its main current facts and figures. A. Analysis of the Chinese retail market China is today part of the WTO, entailing progressive liberalization of the market. Nevertheless, this does not mean that it has become...
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...When done ethically, there is applied importance in attaining information that delineates what other businesses are doing. Falling into unethical traps will cause business chaos. This is why long existing businesses last; by clearing possible liabilities better outcomes will be evident. Eventually, legacies become built and the company’s prominence exerts dominance and confidence. During environmental scanning of a company, there is a thorough assessment into a complete global analysis. This involves companies, markets, clients, industries, and businesses in the same market. For this study will consider the trends, technological events, successes, and expectations in business. Let us commence by a comparison of Costco’s values versus Sam’s Club values. Costco has developed a brand named Kirkland. The Kirkland brand has the Costco expectation to be equivalent or better than national brands. A continual product improvement is the exact objective for the maximum competing goal. Product quality and price comparison is continuously revisited by the internal Costco research team. Sam’s club is a division from the Wal-Mart Corporation. Although Sam’s and Costco have a close race,...
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...reliability and quality assurance. This actually holds true in China were retailers do a better job of enforcing supplier quality than the local regulations. With that, Walmart is still able to use its expertise and knowledge in supplier negotiation and distribution system to keep costs down. Although Walmart is a Joint-Venture, the sources do not mention any attempt to leverage the local partner to meet the local market, which seems the opposite to some other joint ventures discussed like Danone and Wahaha. Working together with the local partner to understand where and how the local regulations can be used or adjusted for Walmart’s success and gaining a stronger hold of the potential customer’s heart might help Walmart’s growth and dominance in the Chinese market (The Economist). Most of what we mentioned about the Chinese consumer habits in previous cases is especially relevant for Walmart. The Chinese consumers go shopping to get out of the house, not necessarily to shop. They’re more impulse driven and like on-site promotions. They’re brand conscious but not loyal. They’re frequent shopper of small amounts and especially...
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...OPERATIONS AND PROJECT MANAGEMENT OPERATIONS AND PROJECT MANAGEMENT OPERATIONS AND PROJECT MANAGEMENT OPERATIONS AND PROJECT MANAGEMENT OPERATIONS AND PROJECT MANAGEMENT www.ibscdc.org 1 Efficient Project Management at TransWorks Information Services Pvt. Ltd., an Indian-based BPO Company This is a real life case taken from a service industry; it discusses the real life problem faced by a BPO Company. It focusess on the problems faced by the calling agents and the management as a whole, many a times it so happens that the management perceives a problem in a different angle and the solution eludes them; this causes a lot of frustration on the part of employees and management resulting in mass attrition. The real concern today for any call centre company is its high attrition rate; the basic reason being the discord between the management and the employee. The employees look out for a congenial and empathetic management and shift to the other competing companies when offered a good work environment. This case study throws light on one such aspect where a mass attrition was avoided by the top management by strategic and lateral thinking. Pedagogical Objectives • How a manager dealt with such a challenging project with support of his team of 14 fresh trainees • How he managed to save the project and bring about some wonderful changes to glide through the difficult times • How innovation and teamwork can change things for an organisation. Industry Reference No. Year of...
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...Wal-Mart Principles of Management Introduction Wal-Mart (Wal-Mart Stores, Inc.) is currently ranked not only as America’s largest, but also as the world’s largest company (Soderquist, 2005). The store’s three business segments, Wal-Mart International, Wal-Mart Stores and Sam’s Club all operate in discount retail industry. Currently Wal-Mart’s leadership is facing challenging issues including an invariable customer base, a declining same store base and a crumbling reputation. However, Wal-Mart’s history is a living example of innovative and successful leadership. The company started with a single store in 1962, in Rogers, Arkansas and it has grown into what is now regarded as the world’s largest retailer. Wal-Mart runs each store with the products stocked in the store, to the front-end equipments, helping to speed up checkouts. Using the same philosophy in all its stores to provide low prices and superior customer service, Wal-Mart can sell at low prices and thus eliminate expenses associated with frequent sales promotions as well as have predictable sales. Wal-Mart has invented its own unique inventory system, the cross-docking system that has enabled the company to achieve economies of scale, thus reducing the cost of sales. In this system, goods are continually delivered to Wal-Mart’s stores within 48 hours and without the store having to inventory them. This allows the stores to replenish their shelves four times faster than...
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...INB400 – International Organization and Management Term paper Wal-Mart’s culturally and institutionally flawed entry into the German retail market Joakim Holsten Leren s105710 Julianne Øien s106222 Mirko Wichmann s145433 Lara-Caterina Buggert s145400 Eloise De Bont s145611 22 pages Table of Contents Introduction 2 Case presentation 2 The Wal-Mart concept 3 Institutional challenges [to be deleted] 4 Cultural challenges [to be deleted] 4 German market 5 Theoretical Background 5 The cultural perspective 6 The institutional perspective 9 Case Analysis 12 The cultural perspective 12 The institutional perspective 15 Recommendations 19 Cultural 19 Institutional 20 Limitations 22 Cultural 22 Institutional 22 Conclusion 23 References: 25 Introduction The purpose of this paper is to address and analyze the challenges Wal-Mart faced during its entrance into the German market in the late 1990s. We have analyzed this with the following problem in mind: “Which aspects, both cultural and institutional, led to Wal-Mart’s failure in Germany and what should they have done instead?” We will approach this problem by outlining theoretical frameworks for analyzing cultural and institutional aspects of a company. We will then employ said theories in order to analyze the case of Wal-Mart’s failure in Germany. Finally, we will come to a conclusion concerning what they should have done as they entered into the German market...
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...penetrating foreign markets, they often face challenges and barriers that are not easily to overcome, such as language, regulation, currency, polity, or economic size. These barriers significantly impact on the activities of a business in a foreign country. Pankaj Ghemawat categorized all barriers into four distances: cultural, geographic, political, and economic distances, which form CAGE framework. He emphasizes that the types of distances influence different businesses in different ways. For example, culture distance determines consumers’ product preferences while geographic distance influences the costs of transportation. Obviously, the future and the success of internationalization in any company depend heavily on the company’s ability to master and reduce barriers, specifically, the four distances. Any company that underestimates their importance or simply ignores the distances may incur a big loss, yet failure. In the retail industry, the failure of Wal-Mart in South Korea is a typical example. After eight years of disappointing sales in South Korea, in 2005, the America’s largest retailer, Wal-Mart, announced to leave the country. A year later, the company quietly transferred all 16 of its South Korean stores to Shinsegae Group, a domestic retailer, for $882 million and officially withdrew from Kimchi (Olsen, 2006). While Wal-Mart has had impressive success in other foreign markets such as Canada, the United Kingdom, and Mexico, Wal-Mart experienced a shameful failure in South...
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...WAL-MART’S PROBLEMS IN Wal-Mart’s Problems in International Market Patiporn Kitlertphiroj University College of University of Denver Abstract Wal-Mart, the biggest retailer in the world, is spreading its power throughout the world, starting with nine countries in Asia, Europe and South America. The expansion has planed for more in the near future. With its attempt to penetrate hypermarket culture in every country which it enters, many severe problems are come into play. Acquisitions and joint venture with local businesses became a problem in nationalism country. Thus, strict governments’ rules and regulations blocked business operations. Misreading competitors and late in entry destroyed location opportunities the same as harmed relationship with local suppliers. Inadaptable to local culture become a big problem in global business. Moreover, low wages, unions and sex discrimination brought Wal-Mart to be an evil in employees’ perspective. Literature Review Wal-Mart is the largest Discount Store in the United States. Its magnitude is not only recognized domestically but also expanded to International Market. The company believes that one day this one will replace the United States position when the trend down (Molin, 2004). With this goal Wal-mart is encouraged to expanding stores into nine countries around the world and more in its plans (About Wal-Mart, 2001). Being number one in the United States does not always guarantee for being number one...
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...PLAN Introduction * What you are going to be reporting on (Company, challenge, PESTLE, SWOT, 5 Forces, CVF – MUST have an explanation of what it is) The Organisation The industry – supermarkets, news, journals * Market Share – who controls the market * Current news? * PESTLE – table and a SUMMARY! * Competitors – 5 forces table + competitor table Organisation - Tesco * Background * Statistics * etc * SWOT Challenge * Define it * In relation to company Recommendations * CVF – where should Tesco be Conclusions TESCO AND GLOBALISATION This Essay would contain information on Tesco as an industry and organisation. It would also analyse Tesco using the four models; PESTLE, SWOT, Porter’s 5 forces and the competitive value framework (CVF). An in-depth look into the term globalisation, its advantage and importance as well a the global challenge Tesco is currently facing, its competitor and how they have reacted to globalisation and recommendations on how to handle their global challenge this paper would contain. Jack Cohen first formed Tesco. This happened in the year 1919 when he first opened up a stall in the East end of London. Tesco started out as a very small business and it did so on the platform of sole proprietorship however today, Tesco is one of the world's largest retailers with a clear, proven growth strategy. It has over 492,000 employees and about 5,300 stores...
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