Another Wallyworld Fail . . .

[CheeseheadEarl]

Good reading, for those who don't know the story. http://www.fastcompany.com/54763/man-who-said-no-wal-mart

 

[BilgeRat]

Thanks, Earl. That's the one. :-)

 

[Ian442]

Dont knock Harbor Freight...

For those of us who only occasionally use our tools HB serves me well.

I also have some WW sold tools as well. My stanley 6 in one screwdrivers are my networking go to tool for rack and switch installs.

 

[NSTG8R]

Dont knock Harbor Freight...

For those of us who only occasionally use our tools HB serves me well.

I also have some WW sold tools as well. My stanley 6 in one screwdrivers are my networking go to tool for rack and switch installs.

Agreed! If you're just needing something to do the job, and aren't expecting Snap-On quality, HB does do the trick.

 

[Lil4X]

People have a tendency to ignore the 50 times they shopped at Walmart without issue when they complain about the two times something went wrong with their Walmart experience. This natural bias towards negative experiences makes it hard to accurately judge the Walmart customers service experience as a whole. Personally I am actually surprised that Walmart does as well as they do considering the size of the work force they have, the amount of shoppers they have, and the fact that problems are guaranteed to occur as nothing works perfectly all the time and humans make mistakes.

Just as an interesting FYI the scale of the company in this country is quite amazing: Walmart is the largest private employer in the USA with about 1.5 million employees in this country. This means that about 1% of the entire active workforce for the country is working for a single private employer. Walmart is the largest employer in 25 states which of course is half the states in the union. Each week nearly one-third of the U.S. population shops at Walmart.

Very true; as anyone in a service business (and who isn't these days?), it takes 250 "attaboys" to overcome ONE "ah s**t!".

 

[BigWarpGuy]

I bought a tablet case at Walmart. It was too small. Since I had my receipt, I was able to get my money back quite easily. I used it to buy a small microwave oven for my apartment.

 

[Hotscoots]

Wal Mart beats up it's suppliers badly. I forget which lawn mower manufacturer it was that I read about, but they turned down a deal with wallyworld because they didn't want to lower their quality standards to what Wal Mart wanted from them.

Home Depot is notorious for screwing their suppliers . Years back I owned a kitchen counter top company and we were thrilled to land HD as a client .
After only 1 year , HD became our largest customer by far . Be careful what you wish for . Regardless of the claims , however minor or trivial , HD would insist we make a brand new top . One customer revealed that they wanted to keep the original to use elsewhere .
More often , savvy HD shoppers would complain about literally nothing to glean a 10-30% credit on their purchase .
HD would simply capitulate and deduct from our invoice . I was warned about these practices from an electrician friend of mine but did not heed good advice .

 

[Mike W]

People have a tendency to ignore the 50 times they shopped at Walmart without issue when they complain about the two times something went wrong with their Walmart experience. This natural bias towards negative experiences makes it hard to accurately judge the Walmart customers service experience as a whole. Personally I am actually surprised that Walmart does as well as they do considering the size of the work force they have, the amount of shoppers they have, and the fact that problems are guaranteed to occur as nothing works perfectly all the time and humans make mistakes.

Just as an interesting FYI the scale of the company in this country is quite amazing: Walmart is the largest private employer in the USA with about 1.5 million employees in this country. This means that about 1% of the entire active workforce for the country is working for a single private employer. Walmart is the largest employer in 25 states which of course is half the states in the union. Each week nearly one-third of the U.S. population shops at Walmart.

And all those factoids are why we don't shop Walmart. We shop either locally or at least not Walmart AND where service is consistant/tolerable AND, when possible, where the workers get paid better. Persnickety? Naw, we just want something better than what they offer (goods, pay rate for workers, treatment of vendors and customers).

 

[Lil4X]

I walked into my neighborhood hardware store - the one that seems to carry all the ancient plumbing and electrical parts for our "historic" homes. It's a part of ACE now, so I expect the corporate giant will swallow up the "neighborhood" ambiance of the store, but whenever I need something a little unusual, I seem to find it there, but this was flat weird.

Our small dog developed a bad case of fleas this winter, but her skin is extremely delicate and conventional flea preparations give her a nasty chemical burn. I somewhere remembered diatomaceous earth was an excellent insect killer - it's a mechanical agent rather than a chemical one - to a bug it's like being tossed into a barrel of razor blades. It seems the tiny crystalline structure of powdered DE gets into the joints of the insect's exoskeleton and slices them up badly, causing them to bleed out. It's not a quick solution, but it is very safe. If you buy "food grade" diatomaceous earth, you can eat it (not recommended, it's really chalky), but it won't hurt you. Some people take it internally for restoration of collagen, or use it as toothpaste or deodorant (our dog could use the latter!).

Now just why I didn't go to the pool supply or janitorial supply for my DE this time, I don't know - but I was looking for "food grade" DE, to be super-safe so I walked into ACE. I asked a clerk for it and he went off hunting . . . meanwhile I looked down at the counter beside me and - (bing!) - a dozen bags of food-grade DE were at my fingertips. OK, am I on Candid Camera, or what?

It's all about providing the selection that anticipates the customer's needs. I don't know how they knew, whether it's just seasonal or what, but the manager told me she's been conducting an informal survey of how people use the stuff. Whaddya know? I'm in the majority, using it as non-toxic flea powder. Thanks ACE!

 

[RUCRAYZE]

Home Depot is notorious for screwing their suppliers . Years back I owned a kitchen counter top company and we were thrilled to land HD as a client .
After only 1 year , HD became our largest customer by far . Be careful what you wish for . Regardless of the claims , however minor or trivial , HD would insist we make a brand new top . One customer revealed that they wanted to keep the original to use elsewhere .
More often , savvy HD shoppers would complain about literally nothing to glean a 10-30% credit on their purchase .
HD would simply capitulate and deduct from our invoice . I was warned about these practices from an electrician friend of mine but did not heed good advice .

One of the really poor customer "tricks" is to buy light bulbs, switch 'em out with burned out ones, and return them in the original cardboard holders. The return clerk, mentioned it "happens all the time"