So, Wal-Mart and Sam’s are stocking so much more organic stuff these days. It’s so hard, because I want to buy from my small local health food store (owned by members of our small group, even!) but they outprice them by SO much and my grocery budget is not unlimited.
I wish I didn’t have to choose between supporting a company I believe in and feeding my family less total organic food and giving my money to the evil empire but getting to eat more organics. I hate that Wal-mart is putting me in this quandry.
I feel your pain. :( x 1000.
Argh! There is a Wal-Mart being put up just down the street from my house. Everything’s so inexpensive… so difficult.
It’s a tricky one, here in the UK it’s the same problem with supermarkets such as Tesco and Asda(owned by Walmart!)
I’ve tried various ways to avoid the supermarkets (we get a weekly organic fruit/veg box, meat from an onloine butcher etc.) but I have had to concede defeat and do some shopping there.
You shouldn’t beat your self up about it, I think the fact that you are buying organic type produce will help make a differnce to the the way the supermarkets buy and sell their produce in the future.
Any reason to hate Walmart is a good one.
I don’t get it. Why does everybody hate Wal Mart so much? Sam Walton just figured out how to do it bigger and cheaper than a lot of other people. Why does that make them so evil?
Am I missing some big piece to this picture? Somebody please explain.
They force companies overseas by telling them “We are going to sell your product for $X. You figure out how to make them that cheap or we’ll find someone else who will.”
They pay their employees terribly.
They don’t value expertise and product knowledge.
etc.
Mark, what Kristen said is just the tip of the iceburg. And, the companies really bad, worst practices of all started after Sam Walton died. The company went from bad to worse.
Kristen and Smocklady,
Thanks for your quick response to my query. However I’m still struggling to understand how the use of free market economics and buying power equates to evil. Is this practice unethical or just smart? Honestly, I can’t say that I know. If someone can provide some Scriptural backing for this point, and some specific examples of how this company is violating Biblical principles, I’m willing to listen and learn.
Somebody provide me details and I might be convinced that I am not seeing things correctly. Perhaps there is something I am missing. Help!
As to the “low wage” issue, at least companies like Wal Mart are providing jobs to people. The alternative for many would be government support or welfare of some kind. Which is worse? The other thing that companies like Wal Mart provide is opportunity for people with ambition and determination to learn and advance themselves by aquiring skills they might never have otherwise learned. This seems to me to be one of the historical strengths of our nation–the opportunity to improve one’s lot in life.
Regarding expertise and product knowledge, if you want that, go to the stores that provide it and pay a little more for your products. Obiviously the people working in those establishments are getting paid higher wages because they are better trained.
http://www.wakeupwalmart.com/facts/
Treating your employees like scum is unbiblical, in my opinion. They are purposefully holding FT employees below the poverty line, they do not provide health insurance for most of their employees, and so those people ARE on welfare.
The reality is that working at Wal-Mart does not improve an employees lot in life.
“Ms. Chambers (WM VP for benefits) acknowledged that 46 percent of the children of Wal-Mart’s 1.33 million United States employees were uninsured or on Medicaid.” –NY Times
Kristen,
Thanks again.
But I need specifics. “Treating your employees like scum …” is general. What does that mean? Give examples.
Where in Scripture do we find that God demands employers to provide health insurance?
I am still trying to understand.
I’m all for free enterprise, but I’m also for fairness. I’m amazed that Wal-Mart has gotten to be the size it is, and by the things it can do at that size, but not all of those things are good. The worst thing about Wally World is its extortion of the supply chain. Kristen, I similarly went to another grocery store to avoid Wal-Mart and bought a gallon of olive oil. Next week we took a family-fun trip to Wal Mart {groan}, where I saw the identical jug of olive oil for eight whole dollars cheaper!!!! At first I was a little peeved at the savings I could’ve had, then I thought about the cashier at the other store who’s so nice she must be on something, and seems to remember all the customers, politely asking them how their shopping went, then I thought that in this situation someone had to get a “rawer” end of the deal among the following: Pompeiian Olive Oil selling to Wally World, Pompeiian Olive Oil selling to Brookshire’s Grocery Company (owner of Super 1 Foods in Ruston), and Brad Bourgeois purchasing from Brookshire’s Grocery Company instead of Wal-Mart. Given Wally World’s track record, on a larger scale than my small potatoes, I’d think it was Pompeiian selling to Wal-Mart.
As a business man, I’m even seeing Wal-Mart’s milking-of-its-vendors trickle into my daily operations. As I’m visiting with my company’s banker, sighing over some of our collection woes from what were formerly our biggest and best customers – some of the biggest corporations in the world – he’s telling me that Wal-Mart set the precedent for riding out terms longer than agreed upon, and setting payment terms for longer and longer periods, using its own (constant and plentiful) cash flow and tying up its vendors’. That’s just dispicable, people! It’s been on the top of the Fortune 500 for several years (until ExxonMobil dethroned it this year – don’t even get me started there!), but if that’s what it did to get there, I don’t want any part of it. My banker went on to discuss his own former customers who are now defunct largely because of Wal-Mart. I’d certainly read about this happening to several companies, but it had never hit so close to home!
Though it may be run by Mormons, give me my wonderful Olde Wheat Barn over Wally World any day, where Denise the cashier asks me how my fitness plan is going, and orders items for me that are out of stock or that they no longer carry. They don’t really have a good produce selection, though, and so we have yet to face that quandary…
I’m certainly no hot-blooded anti-Wal-Mart crusader (yet), Adrienne goes there because it is nice to be able to take the kids and get most of what we need in one place, but we are squeamish about it.
We certainly know what it’s like to feel a single bag of groceries from the health food store impact the budget, but Kristen, I’d really encourage you to keep shopping with your brothers and sisters in Christ. It’s a model example of what we always hear about Wal-Mart doing to its suppliers and the businesses in its communities. Rest assured someone will be getting dealt a raw hand from Wal-Mart. If not now, they will soon.
Brad, et al,
These are interesting, anecdotal tales.
What I am proposing is that if one is to crusade for or against something in the name of Christ, one better be prepared to defend one’s position with more than stories and accusations.
If, as Christians, we find ourselves carrying a passion for something, as you folks do, then our passions need to be undergirded by a sound, Biblical apologetic.
All I am trying to do here is to get people to think clearly from a Biblical perspective. And by Biblical, I don’t mean just the New Testament, but the whole, grand metanarrative of Scripture.
I say, “More power to all of you to pursue with passion what you believe on this issue.” I too am passionate about a number of things. In fact, what I am doing right now is pursuing MY passion, which is clear-headed thinking from a Biblically-informed mind.
And frankly, I don’t care much for Wal-Mart myself. In fact, I generally don’t support the BIG BOX stores. When possible, I prefer shopping at our locally owned shops. I too, like supporting the little guy.
I am just not yet convinced from a Biblical point of view that the word “evil” is appropriate for those who are using the free market to make profit.
Mark,
See the link in comment 9. If you can’t see the cruelty in those statistics, I really can’t dialogue with you and further on this.
Brad,
Thanks for the encouragement, brother.
Brad,
Thanks for the link reference. I promise I will check it out and mull it over.
And thank you for considering my perspective. “Iron sharpens iron,” and you folks have awakened me to something I had not considered. I hope I have done the same for you.
God Bless all of you,
Mark
Kristen,
I am sorry. I misread your comments as being from Brad. I should have directed them to you instead. I apologize.
Thanks for dialoging with me!
Mark
Mark,
Just wondering, when in this discussion was anyone crusading in the name of Christ? You were the one who made this about “is Wal-Mart biblical?”
I can crusade for midwifery (which I have) and not think giving birth with a midwife is a more “Christian” way to do things (which I don’t). But somehow, if Wal-mart comes up, it’s automatically a holy war?
I believe in having a fully orbed Christian worldview but I also believe it is foolish to expect scripture to dictate every single choice we make as consumers. God never says we can’t be passionate about things not directly spoken of in scripture…
Mark:
“As I’m visiting with my company’s banker…he’s telling me that Wal-Mart set the precedent for riding out terms longer than agreed upon, and setting payment terms for longer and longer periods, using its own (constant and plentiful) cash flow and tying up its vendors’.”
My banker did not cite specific court cases or companies involved, but he is basing his statements on market trend analyses performed over the course of several years.
The above, in effect, is a violation of the eighth commandment, as well as the various admonitions in the Book of Proverbs against unjust weights and measures.
I understand you do not seek “chapter-and-verse prooftext” apologetic, but one based on the entirety of the Scriptures and the whole story they tell. Measured against that yardstick, I can only say that Wal-Mart is a vapor in the eyes of the Sovereign God – and this conversation may be considered vanity. Nevertheless, Wal-Mart is an entity with which believers across the world interact, and when we observe both positive and negative rippling effects from Wal-Mart, as thinking believers, we are inclined to do a sort of cost/benefit analysis, and measure that analysis according to God’s Word, the Church’s instruction, and our own conciences, and then act. Many – including myself – are still puzzled and ambivalent about the issue, but it doesn’t mean we are not trying to do as you ask. In the meantime, read these dialogs as part of our grapplings, not necessarily our conclusions.
For Christ and the advancement of His glorious kingdom,
Brad
Kristen,
Thank you for challenging me on this. You bring up a good point, and if I misunderstood, then I stand corrected.
Obviously, I too believe in having a “fully-orbed” Christian Worldview. (I like that phrase by the way. Can I use it?) And I believe that that Worldview should inform everything I do.
I don’t believe I am questioning whether Wal Mart is Biblical, but rather whether the term “evil” applies to their business practices, and if it does, can those practices be challenged from Scripture, and not just how we personally feel or react to them.
I am not disagreeing with you necessarily that they AREN’T evil. I am simply questioning that as a Christian with a desire to “right the wrongs”–if that’s appropriate–are we basing our efforts solely on how we feel and react to stories and anecdotes (and in some cases, facts)? Or are we challenging the practices of a company (in this case Wal Mart) from a Biblical framework?
If we can’t do this, then I believe that our efforts will fall short because they will be based upon emotion and opinion and reaction. And those things are so relative. They are the shifting and sinking sands that Jesus warned us against building upon. For those of us seeking a “fully orbed” Christian worldview, Scripture alone is what we must ultimately stand upon.
I hope I have explained myself a little better this time, and if I conveyed an unfriendly tone earlier, please forgive me. It was not my intention.
Here is an article I remembered reading some months ago that I dug up for this discussion. It’s about the offer Wal-Mart made to the owner of Snapper Lawn Mowers to make Snapper mowers the ‘IT’ mower at Wal-Mart, a deal that would have made Snapper a sizeable profit, and how the deal required Snapper to practically turn the machines into disposable lawn mowers so that Wal-Mart could sell them at cheap prices. This article, I think, illustrates a lot of the aesthetic distaste many of us have for Wal-Mart.
http://www.fastcompany.com/magazine/102/open_snapper.html
“aesthetic distate” and “True Evil” are two very different things.
Oops. I meant “distaste.” I was being too hasty.
They are different things, but they often have features in common.
I’m not calling them the same thing here.
When I look at my local Wal-Mart employees, I honestly see many who qualify as “the least of these” in our society. I believe that having company policies of firing workers who have been on the job “too long” because they aren’t any more “productive” than those who have been there a year and cost more is wrong. I believe that paying your average employee a wage ABOVE THE POVERTY LINE is just and right (and Wal-Mart does not do that.) I do see Wal-Mart as a modern day oppressor of the poor and unskilled in our society and that IS evil.
…it’s not an oppression unique to Wal-Mart, though. Much of the “Fortune 500” remain on that list not only because of their size, but their abilities to manage their workforce to the benefit of their bottom lines. It’s a fine line to walk, though, and one I get to see daily. Sinking or swimming, being in the red and being in the black, is often driven heavily by labor costs. By God’s grace I work for guys who, though rough around the edges, remember where they came from and try as much as possible to manage their financial performance while “doing right” by their employees.
…and another note on Wal-Mart. In their defense, I doubt that their executives have their “evil” (term used somewhat hyperbolically) strategic planning meetings where they seek to eliminate all local shops after they outprice them all into closing their doors. Rather, they are giving to the consumer what their overwhelming collective voice seems to want – the lowest price possible for everyday goods. (this is starting to scare me – terms like “collective” and “Evil Empire” hehe) It isn’t really Wal-Mart going further and further down the supply chain hacking away at costs, it’s ultimately the consumer behavior driving Wal-Mart to do this in order to please its customers. Yes, Wal-Mart is pushing just to see how far back it can “roll back prices,” and it could come to a point where it says “OK, enough rolling back,” but shoppers don’t want it to stop. We want to keep making our dollars stretching – especially to fit the new #1 Fortune 500’s growing demands for our pennies to fill our gas tanks! At some point there will be no room to cut, and it’s that point that will be frightening.
First, I should be upfront about the fact that I havea family friend who was a VP with Wal-Mart for several years, although he no longer works there. So, yes, there’s my bias.
Going on, Kristen said, “I believe that paying your average employee a wage ABOVE THE POVERTY LINE is just and right (and Wal-Mart does not do that.) I do see Wal-Mart as a modern day oppressor of the poor and unskilled in our society and that IS evil.”
I’ve yet to read anywhere in the Bible where God held a company responsible for sin or claimed that a non-human, non-angelic or non-demonic entity could be “evil.” Personally, I feel that it is foolish for people to campaign for Wal-Mart to “find salvation.” It seems to me that it’s better to concentrate on the salvation of the decision-makers of such a company.
As for the decision-makers, they are either saved or not saved. If they are saved, then they are our brothers and sisters in Christ and we need to follow the biblical commands for dealing with them. (i.e. I would feel pretty bad if people were discussing my sin in a blog post. I would feel incredibly bad if they hadn’t made an attempt to discuss it with me privately first.) If they’re not saved, then we need to go about winning them for Christ.
I realize that it’s different than your average situation because you most likely don’t know most of these executives, but I think prayer, letter-writing and other methods can be very effective in situations like this. I’m not sure condemning a company as a whole is very effective though.
Megan,
Kate on lap so a quick reply: what about nations? God held them responsible for sin and honestly, modern-day corporations are not much different than ancient nations…
I really don’t understand your argument. Exec finds Jesus, wants to start paying people better, rocks the boat, gets fired. We need more than just a one-by-one mentality with corporations of Wal-Mart’s scope and influence. I think widespread condemning and boycotting would be the most effective way to deal with Wal-Mart. Unfortunately for single-income families when WM charges HALF of the msrp for items, it is difficult to boycott them. We spend about 20% of our monthly food budget at Wal-Mart currently.
To All,
Just so no one will think I am a “drive-by” poster, I had to leave my office for a few hours to take care of some business.
This conversation has been very stimulating for me. I hope it has been for others as well.
If anyone would like to pop over to my blog(s) to critique my ideas, I would welcome you.
http://kingdom-church-culture.blogspot.com/
http://www.at-home-thinking.blogspot.com/
I’ve got work to do, so I’m going to bow out for now.
Thanks for letting me comment.
Despite our varying views, we are all one body in Christ Jesus. All praise be to Him!
Mark
It should be noted that Wal-Mart is now starting to hold training seminars prior to their entering into a community to train the local businesses how to compete with them. I kid you not, NPR did a whole piece on it, on All Things Considered, IIRC. I’m sure a quick google search will turn up the exact piece.
Take a look at these and it may send chills down your spine as it did mine. And, Yes, Brad, they (the execs) do drive down the streets and take bets on how long before each mom & pop store will be closing.
Wal-mart movie
Confessions of a Wal-mart hitman>/a>
sorry about those links – I need a nap:
Wal-mart movie trailer
Confessions of a Wal-mart hitman
That should work.
Kristen said, “I really don’t understand your argument. Exec finds Jesus, wants to start paying people better, rocks the boat, gets fired. We need more than just a one-by-one mentality with corporations of Wal-Mart’s scope and influence.”
First off, I’m fairly sure that the angels in heaven celebrate over each and every sinner who repents, so if the decision makers at Wal-Mart are saved one by one, sure, some of them might lose their jobs, but I think it would have an impact on their business. Second, you say that boycotting and condemning would be most effective against Wal-Mart. Well, I’m not sure what they would be effective at. I guess it depends on what your goal is. My goals are to love Christ and make him known. Thus, I feel that boycotting and condemning would go against my goals. What are your goals?
Of course, my ultimate purpose is to glorify God and enjoy him forever, but that doesn’t mean that I can’t boycott Wal-Mart and condemn their business practices.
By caring about the way Wal-Mart treats their employees, I am caring about the “least of these” in our society, people created in the image of God who deserve to be paid well enough to eat and live simply for their work.
By caring about the way Wal-Mart does business with their suppliers, I am caring both about American jobs and labor conditions in the third world, where Wal-Mart gets most of its products from.
If you read my original post, I was lamenting that Wal-Mart is making me choose between two things I care very deeply about: supporting local Christian business and feeding my family organic foods. And I think caring about both those issues is part of a Christian worldview.
Kristen, I understand. For us it is very similar. And it is also a decision of stewardship for us. but being a good steward is more than just pinching pennies. Being a good steward requires more than just a fianancial decision. I am not convinced that spending my money at Wal-mart to save some money is being a good steward of that money. I believe it goes deeper. Supporting what we believe to be right and wrong. Now, I’ll be the first to fuss about all the ‘Christian” stuff out there; I hate that so many Christians can not be in the world and not of it, that is that so much marketing is done to the extent that there is a Christian version of everything. We have not shown ourselves to be mature in Christ until we have the ability to live IN this world and descern right from wrong, good from evil, and what edifies and what tears down my soul, my walk, my love, my life with Christ and the glory those decisions show or don’t show. I think that being a good steward of our (ours, my family’s) finances is spending it elsewhere, when I have the other options. This world is not perfect and as a result individual decisions must be made daily. I don’t for think that my not shopping at Wal-mart will have one effect on them at all, but I know in my heart that I can NOT support that business. I can not Business practices that so negatively effect people. And I totally understand, Kristen, how hard this is for you.
Megan S., I understand your side too. But I think that instead of the word ‘goals’ maybe ‘convictions’ would be a better choice. Let me share a little story with you – a true one. While I was in college a dear friend of mine got pregnant, she was determined to have an abortion. She asked me to drive her to the clinic where she had an appointment. I tried to talk her out of it and to make a long story short, I was not able to talk her out of it nor get her to a valid doctor for any form of counseling. I could not be her driver, my personal convictions were too strong on this point. I could not in any way be apart of that, even to the extent of being her support. This is my conviction. My sister, eight years younger, was approached by a friend in the very same situation; she asked my sister to drive her to the state where an abortion could be done. My sister didn’t want to but she did anyway. We have both sobbed over our decisions. I regret that I was not a better friend, but my convictions about abortion are strong. My sister regrets having anything to do with it and feels she played a part in the death of a child, but her convictions were to be there for her friend because her friend was going to do it anyway and had no one else to turn to. Neither decision was easy, neither decision was good, neither decision was bad. It’s a personal conviction. And if you are convicted to shop there as a means of ‘evangelism’ then by all means go for it and more power to you. I make my stance by NOT shopping there and giving them my finances to support their business practices.
Wal-mart and abortion are no where near the same thing, but the princile of the conviction is. If I knew a friend was not one to partake of alcohol but had no problems with my partaking then it is ok for me to drink around that friend. If I know that a friend has a problem with alcohol then it is wrong for me to not only offer him a drink, but to also drink with him a round.
I too hate that Wal-mart is putting the general population into the quandry of either dependency on them or the need to choose where and how to spend their hard earned money. Wal-mart’s business practices are not of fair-trade or marketing. Wal-mart is out to better itself while disguising the tactics as helping the little man, the common man, while actually causing great harm to the whole.
I worked at Walmart during college and loved it. They treated me very well and worked around my class schedule with no complaints. I was even promoted several times. Many times the company would give money to associates who were in need, and the associates would also give out of their own pockets when another associate was struggeling through something. I had a very good experience in my 3 years with the company (and I worked at 2 different sttores!) Although I had a good experience there, I do not think this “empire” is exactly what Sam Walton had in mind. As part of my training for one of the positions I was promoted to, we learned about Mr. Sam and he was a very Godly, family-oriented man. I also know that Walmart has more people in uniform than all branches of the military combined…and I think that is ridiculous…I’m mixed on the topic! I think Walmart has gotten out of hand…!
I so agree with the original post– I go through that a lot as we are on a limited budget also. The comments are very insightful too. :)
Isn’t offering the lowest price for products helping some of the “least of these” by giving them prices they can afford to feed and clothe their families?
And isn’t giving them some sort of wage better than no wage at all? Surely Wal-Mart is not the only company that doesn’t supply health care benefits to their employees, unfortunately.
Maybe I don’t have a full understanding of economics. :)
http://www.jibjab.com/JokeBox/JokeBox_JJOrig.aspx?movieid=122
This is an extreme oversimplification, but… there’s definite truth in it.
Laura Leigh is asking some good questions, and while I still don’t think Wal-Mart is all that admirable, the points she brings up have come to mind. There are many families for whom Wal-Mart is a real help in terms of finding low-cost items. Whether or not the means that Wal-Mart uses to provide that to the people who need it, well, that’s the big issue. Is anyone allowed to do whatever is needed just to provide the lowest price to the consumer, even if the consumer is needy?
Three and a half years ago, my husband got a part time job at Wal-Mart. At that time we had a lot of extra medical expenses as I had just had major surgery and our only car had died. It gave us a boost in income at a time we really needed it. He worked perhaps 20 hrs a week at first. Later that year, he graduated with his second degree from College and found what we thought at the time was the perfect job for him in his field. So he quit his full time job, took this supposed great new job and continued for that season to work at Wal-Mart. Eight weeks later, my husband was laid off from the supposed great new full time job. He immediately went to work full time at Wal-Mart. Every job he was offered..in his field, or outside of it, paid less than Wal-Mart. He would apply for a job with 800 other applicants (no joke) At this time (and still to this day) Wal-Mart was provision from God. Many of the employees there, that have worked there for several years make a very good wage. They do offer insurance…but we never signed up for it. He eventually did (after a 10 month search) find a job, not a job in his field, but a job that had more promise for him to at least have a better wage. Later in that first year he was promoted to a job within that company to do what he wanted to be doing. He still works part time at Wal-Mart, for now because the extra income is nice (especially given we have two children that will be entering college in the next 2-4 yrs.) We do not always like how Wal-Mart is, but they were there for us when we needed them in a job-they were there for us for extra income as we’ve needed it. They are not the only company that acts this way, nor will they be the last. People only have so much money they can spend.
Kristen, I just wanted to encourage you and know what a difficulty this is. It’s really hard for us now, as graduate students, to not just go for the cheap option regardless of the implilcations of that decision; and often, I choose the cheap option because it’s more convenient. I’m glad to hear of people like you thinking through these issues (and I’ve linked this post from our blog, too).