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Noise from Wal-Mart haters drowns out retailer's positive messages Saturday, Nov 12, 2005 By Wesley Brown Despite always low prices, the intense anger often aimed at Bentonville's Wal-Mart Stores Inc. could easily fill the pages of a good-sized metropolitan daily. And while many of the retailer's past and current PR woes can be blamed on its own media paranoia and a never-ending quest to cut cost, boost profits and keep prices low, there is a growing culture of Wal-Mart bashers who see evil behind every Wal-Mart deed. Even the company's earnest goodwill, which was evident in its response to Katrina victims, is seen as something sinister by the ever-growing number of Wal-Mart hate groups. First, there is the frontline of anti-Wal-Mart soldiers, such as the Washington, D.C.-based group called Wal-Mart Watch. This coalition of more than 300 groups, ranging from the nation's largest unions to anti-sprawl activists, has made it their life's work to frustrate the Bentonville behemoth in the same way that the Lilliputians wore down Gulliver. Then there are community-minded business people who fear that Wal-Mart is the end to all things mom and pop. Take Wal-Mart's Aug. 25 application to the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. to form a charter bank in Utah. According to the four-part application, Wal-Mart plans to start an industrial loan holding corporation, which would allow the retailer to process debit, credit and electronic check transactions. Normally, FDIC officials say, such applications will get 10 to 20 letters of protest or support. Yet Wal-Mart's attempt to perform certain banking functions has generated so many objections that a special "information center" has been set up at the FDIC's Web site to handle the retailer's case. As of Nov. 2, more than 1,500 letters have been sent to the FDIC regional office in San Francisco, which is expected to decide on the Wal-Mart application sometime next year. And not all of the letters are from community bankers who fear that Wal-Mart will drive them out of business. For instance, an Oct. 7 letter from a Florida man goes into a tirade against the late Sam Walton and the company's "$4 million a day public relations machine." "The Walton family, particularly Sam, founded the company on the basis of lowering prices by withholding decent pay from its employees and creating poor work conditions within its stores," the Ocala, Fla., letter writer says. "By lowering prices, Sam Walton managed to destroy many businesses that made small towns livable." One will also find dozens of letters to federal regulators from so-called community bankers that appear to be written by the same person. Interestingly, several letters begin with this similar refrain: "I am a community banker and believe strongly that allowing Wal-Mart to own a bank charter and potentially open branches in its network of stores would do irreparable harm to my community and my institution, and pose a severe systemic risk to our nation's economy." But other letters are more sober and definitely more genuine, including one from Wal-Mart's own backyard. W.A. Huspeth III, the president and CEO at the Bank of Berryville, appeals to federal banking regulators to deny Wal-Mart's application in single paragraph. "Having grown up in rural Northwest Arkansas, the breeding ground of Wal-Mart, and experiencing first hand 'The Wal-Mart Way,' I can assure you it will be the biggest mistake of your career to approve the application ...," Huspeth writes to John Carter, director of FDIC's office in San Francisco. Currently, Wal-Mart allows about 300 local and community banks to operate branches in more than 1,000 SuperCenters and Wal-Mart stores. "It's so easy to launch these letter-writing campaigns from a Web site," Wal-Mart spokesman Marty Heires said. "A lot of people are reading things into our (application) that is not there." In a news release sent by Heires, Wal-Mart reiterated this summer when it announced its banking plans that it has no plans to operate branch banks or engage in lending of any type. "The bank's goal is to enable Wal-Mart to continue to offer 'Every Day Low Prices' to its customers by keeping its costs low," the company said. Unfortunately, even though Wal-Mart's banking application could save its shoppers a lot of money, the world's largest retailer still has a hard time getting people to believe it. ------ Wesley Brown is business editor for the Arkansas News Bureau in Little Rock. His e-mail address is wbrown@arkansasnews.com. |
