Bulk-buy Roman

Sam Walton: The King of Walmart, the man who started discount retail. Also, the man driving us crazy with so many bargains!


South Park, as always, has the best view on everything including Walmart:

Enough discount bulk-buy roman to last me a thousand winters? Mr. Walton you got yourself a god damn deal!

In all seriousness however Stan does ask a great question. How is it that Walmart can sell so much for so little? To answer that let's dive into Sam Walton's biography Made in America, where he gives out all his business strategies, that drove his original dime & five stores into the multi-billion business that pretty much every American knows today.

To answer Stan's question, Walton would most likely respond with his quote: "Buy it low, stack it high, sell it cheap."

What Sam means by this quote is truly the essence of discounting, by cutting your price, you can boost your sales to a point where you earn for more. You can lower your markup price but earn more because of increased sales volume.

A very simple concept, yet Sammy boy here took it and ran as far as he could with it. His driving force behind this billion dollar retailer? Pure competitiveness and a few rules to do business by. Walton was so competitive to the point where if he wasn't in his own store, he was in his competitors stores' taking notes on everything to find an edge. From this strive to be the best Mr. Walton came out not only on top of the retail world, but also with his 10 essential business rules.


Here the rules that Sam laid down that lead him to to the top:

SAM WALTON'S 10 RULES FOR BUSINESS

1. Commit

Believe in your business more than anyone else and have passion for your business

2. Share your profits
Treat your associates like your partners, people are your greatest asset .

3. Motivate
"If you expect great things from folks, they'll expect it from themselves."

4. Communicate
Information is power; the more you empower your associates, the more they'll care.

5. Appreciate
Appreciate everything that your associates do for the business. "Nothing else can quite substitute for a few well-chosen, well-timed, sincere words of praise. They're absolutely free- and worth a fortune."

6. Celebrate your Success
Find humor in your failures. Loosen up and everyone around you will loosen up. Have fun. Show enthusiasm, always.

7. Listen
Your employees are the ones that really know what's going on down on the sales floor. Get your employees talking about what they like/what can be improved.

8. Exceed
Exceed your customers expectations. Go above and beyond with your service. Don't make excuses - apologize and fix the problem.

9. Control
Control your expenses better than your competition. Have the lowest expense to sales ratio. Be efficient.

10. Swim Upstream
Go the other way. Ignore the conventional wisdom. Don't let the populace tell you you're going the wrong way. Go into the business that has the most promise for the least amount of money.


All of it is solid advice and each rule goes more into detail within his book.

 If you are an entrepreneur at heart, or any sort of businessman/woman, Walton's book is a must read simply because it is like Mr. Walton's brain is right there for the picking!