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2 comments | Mar 20, 2009

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OBAMA ADMINISTRATION RULES THAT DUKES v. WAL-MART TO MOVE FORWARD

• Obama Administration Sides With Wal-Mart Workers [Bloomberg News]
  The Obama administration sided with women suing Wal-Mart Stores Inc. for discrimination, urging a federal appeals court to let the current and former workers sue as a group and proceed with the biggest sex-bias case in U.S. history.
  

• EEOC Reverses Stance on Wal-Mart Class in Gender Bias Case [National Law Journal]
  The federal government got off the sidelines Thursday to throw a few blocks for plaintiffs in a huge gender class action against Wal-Mart.
  

• Pay Equity: Will Lilly Help Betty? [New York Times Economix Blog]
  Legal cases like this typically don’t get much attention from the media until they are resolved. But the Wal-Mart class-action suit has been publicized by the writer Liza Featherstone as well as activists at Wal-Mart Watch.
  

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11 comments | Feb 13, 2009

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WAL-MART RELEASES 2009 HEALTH CARE ENROLLMENT NUMBERS

• At Wal-Mart, a Health-Care Turnaround [Washington Post]
  Washington policymakers contemplating a fundamental overhaul of the nation's troubled health-care system may want to study the saga of Wal-Mart.
  

• Wal-Mart says more U.S. employees have health coverage [Reuters]
  Wal-Mart Stores Inc said on Friday that the number of U.S. employees who have health care coverage through its plans or another source has risen to 94.5 percent from 92.7 percent a year ago.
  

• After Heavy Doses of Criticism, Wal-Mart Boosts Health Image [Wall Street Journal Blogs]
  Still, some workers say they still can’t afford the coverage. Andrew Stern, president of the Service Employees International Union and a frequent Wal-Mart critic, told the Post the company still doesn’t give enough for health care, considering its financial success.

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4 comments | Dec 02, 2008

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Customers of Wal-Mart’s European retail front Asda, may want to take a closer look at the fruit they have purchased from the chain.  A woman in Wisbech, Cambs UK got more than she bargained for when she purchased an ordinary bunch of bananas: a little scorpion!  Laura Miller returned the bananas to the store and was met with laughter from the employees; not so funny when you take into consideration that Laura is the mother of a six-month-year-old who could have been seriously hurt by the then unidentified species of scorpion. 

Laura brought the scorpion to a pet shop to ascertain it’s species.  It was determined that the scorpion was of the Israeli Gold variety which while not poisonous, has a very painful sting.  The Sun (UK) reports that an Asda spokesman had this to say of the incident:

“We have rigorous inspection processes in place from the moment our bananas are picked right the way through to reaching our shelves, so we’re scratching our heads as to how this could’ve happened,” adding: “We sell 10million bananas on a weekly basis and this is the only reported incident.”

Not so fast, unnamed Asda spokesman, ABC News reported about eight months ago about a 12-year-old girl being stung by a scorpion in a South Carolina Wal-Mart, that was hiding in a Watermelon crate.  Perhaps Wal-Mart Stores Inc. needs to take a closer look at their rigorous produce-inspection processes. Perhaps shoppers should also look into buying local produce to avoid a foreign insect invasion in their own homes!

Scorpion Found in Bananas [The Sun (UK)]

Laura Miller, 20, found the dangerous critter – which had crawled out of her fruit bowl – inside a pair of jeans.

The shocked mother-of-one went back to Asda in Wisbech, Cambs, where she had bought the bananas from.

But Laura, who has a six-month-old tot, was confronted by giggling workers.

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27 comments | Sep 22, 2008

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Wal-Mart’s wholly-owned UK subsidiary, Asda, has just spent over $180,000 launching two websites recruiting employees for its stores. Unlike in the U.S., where Wal-Mart is essentially unrivaled, the U.K. retail market is extremely competitive for Asda, and the store must be having trouble hiring and retaining employees. We can’t imagine that the company’s notoriously bad labor practices have anything to do with it.

The video above, taken from one of Asda’s new websites, discusses the benefits of working at Asda (read the transcript here (PDF)). Let’s take a look at just what those benefits are.

1. “It’s not just your salary or your car allowance at all.” Benefit number one: we will pay you!

2. “We get a benefits book which gives us all our discounts on theme parks and car parking at airports and things like that, just because you work at ASDA.”
Who needs a living wage when you can get a dollar off at the airport parking garage?

3. “I think my favourite benefit at ASDA is the Sharesave Scheme.” That is, just like everyone else in the capitalist system, employees are entitled to buy shares of the company stock. In fact, we’d love it if you did: the executives’ yachts aren’t going to repaint themselves.

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3 comments | Sep 08, 2008

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Wal-Mart has built a reputation cold-hearted censorship - whether it’s record albums or movies, the retailer has massive control over the content of the media it sells.

Now it seems like the practice has spread to newspapers: employees at Wal-Mart’s British stores were ordered to remove competitors’ fliers from the daily papers, and cover up certain papers when competitors ran front page ads. Unlike in the U.S., Wal-Mart is only the second largest retailer in the U.K., and has been fiercely battling other retailers for months. The employees eventually pushed back against the practice, refusing to comply with such underhanded tactics. If only everyone along the Wal-Mart supply chain had such gumption.

Asda staff expose mangers’ dirty tricks to sabotage Tesco adverts [Sunday Mail (U.K.)]

ASDA staff were ordered to take Tesco flyers out of newspapers and dump them in bins as supermarket price wars turned nasty.

But staff blew the whistle as they felt too ashamed to carry out the sneaky tactics. Red-faced Asda bosses yesterday admitted thousands of leaflets were binned at an Edinburgh store.

Workers there claimed bosses even turned down their request to put the promos in a recycling bin.

A member of staff at the capital’s Chesser store said: “One of the people in the cigarette kiosk had to take all the inserts out and bin them. He was really hacked off about it.

“The guy asked the manager if they could at least take the leaflets to the recycling bin but were told not to.”

When Tesco took out a full frontpage advert on a local paper, staff were told to cover the issue up.

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2 comments | Aug 19, 2008

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U.K. dairy farmers are outraged over the latest price war between Wal-Mart owned Asda and rival Tesco.  Last week, the grocers announced price cuts on milk, which farmers argue will devastate their industry.  For farmers coping with escalating production costs, the price cuts arrive at a most inopportune moment.  Asda, however, is applauding itself for its efforts, relishing in the fact that the prices are the lowest they have been since 2001.

Asda claims that the move is an investment for its customers and that it will not affect the dairy farmers.  But farmers justly harbor immense skepticism, noting that the average selling price has increased from 41.2p to 51.6p per liter (a 22% rise) since 1995, while their profit margins have decreased from 24.5p to 18p per liter (a 27% decline).

According the British National Farmer’s Union, this brutal monopsony has contributed to the sharp decline in farmers – down to 2,000 from 5,000 – over the past 10 years.  Ironically, while farmers have suffered, Asda’s own profit margins on milk have actually risen from 1.3p to 15.6p per liter (a 1200% increase since 1995).

Given Asda’s history of milking farmers for their profits, NFU frustrations are merited, especially in a tough economy that leaves no further room to bend to Asda and Wal-Mart’s monopsony.  Traditionally, when suppliers have resisted the retail giant’s price demands, the corporation has threatened suppliers, increased the shelf space of its own brands, and discontinued the stocking of a product, which has driven suppliers out of business.

But in this case, can Asda really begin producing its own milk?  Considering the steadily decreasing profit margins for the milk industry, it wouldn’t be surprising if Asda’s long term strategy included a buyout of milk farms for its own gain.  Who knows?  In the mean time, however, some farmers are considering protesting.

2 comments | Aug 18, 2008

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Wal-Mart-owned Asda has added its latest entry into the company’s history of bizarre stories.  The grocer was recently forced by outraged consumers to recall pet toys made with real animal fur at 275 of its stores.  One of the toys was confirmed to have been made with rabbit’s fur, which infuriated animal rights protests, arguing that fur is acquired barbaric conditions.  The activists suspect that many of the toys could be made with dog or cat fur, since Asda asks few questions of its Chinese suppliers.  (Read: your cat could be chewing on its cousin’s skin.) They have also called on the government to mandate labeling so that consumers can be aware which fur is real and which is synthetic.  Asda’s manufacturer has called it a ‘slip-up,’ but this most recent business blunder surely leaves writers thinking “you can’t write stories this good.”

Read the full story below:

Outrage as supermarket giant sells real fur toy [Sunday Herald (U.K.)]

OUTRAGED CONSUMERS have forced supermarket giant Asda to remove pet toys made out of real fur from 275 of its stores. The consumer campaign has exposed how many items, which customers are buying on the high street in the belief that they are made from fake fur, are actually made from real fur.

Animal rights protesters noticed the Swipe’n’Sway toy, a cuddly mouse for cats to play with, in an Asda store in the Wirral near Liverpool and sent it for testing. It was found to be made from rabbit fur. Animal groups are warning that there is a chance that toys from other stores could be made from cat or dog fur because Chinese suppliers are not honest about what they are selling.

The toy found its way on to shelves after a slip-up by manufacturer, Hartz.

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4 comments | Jul 31, 2008

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Yesterday we posted a story from the U.K. about a list of “requests” Asda’s magazine purchaser made of its suppliers. Among the set of outrageous demands: profit improvements, new fees for store space and two pages of editorial space in every publication.

As is so often the case with Wal-Mart, once its exploitative behavior was exposed to the light of day the retailer backpedaled furiously, said the demands were “a mistake” and blamed some poor low-level executive.

This isn’t an isolated incident, however, of Wal-Mart using its power unfairly. The statement of one publishing industry insider could be applied to any one of a number of industries that Wal-Mart has relentlessly bullied in to lowering prices:

“Its absurd demands show a complete failure to comprehend the costs of producing a magazine. A demand for two pages of advertising/editorial in each magazine is tantamount to blackmail.”

For those who argue that Wal-Mart’s monopsony is good for consumers, think about a world where corporations write your magazine articles. Wal-Mart’s marketplace dominance might mean lower prices, but it seems unwise to trust a corporation with so much power.

Asda admits ‘mistake’ in magazine distribution row [Brand Republic]

Asda has told Campaign that it made a mistake when it asked magazine distributors to grant it free editorial space in titles of its choosing.

Magazine publishers have branded Asda a “schoolyard bully” after it proposed changes to distribution arrangements that insiders say would “devastate” the industry.

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0 comments | Jul 30, 2008

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Asda’s magazine purchaser recently e-mailed the company’s magazine suppliers, demanding either two pages of editorial space or advertising space each month in publications sold at Asda.  The email also requested that the suppliers pay Asda £2,500 for shelf space in any new store that is opened, and also an “item set up” fee of £2,464 any new titles distributed in Asda stores.  [Click here for the original e-mail or the full story.]

The first baffling aspect of this move by Asda is not the motivation, but the audacity.  These demands encroach upon the voice that publications give to particular issues and constituents.  By elbowing its way onto the editorial pages, Asda (which is owned by Wal-Mart) would have the potential to silence those issues or spin them in whatever way bolsters their profit margins.  (Now, some would argue that Asda or Wal-Mart may write on issues in which they are interested that could correspond with the themes of the publication.  But if that were the case, then these companies would have conveyed that interest and demonstrated more than a superficial commitment by already submitting pieces or working directly with particular communities.)

The alternative to the editorial pages is the advertising space, where magazines traditionally earn most of their revenue.  Not only would this amount to lost revenue for the magazines, but it would also foster serious tensions with Asda’s competitors.  The price wars between Asda and Tesco have been bloody, and if magazine publishers agree to Asda’s demands, other distributors would surely revolt.

Moreover, cowering to such a demand by grocers and retailers would severely compromise any notion of a publisher’s content independence.  An initiative that provides Asda and Wal-Mart the ability to alter any of the content of a magazine is a slippery slope away from a top-down regulation of speech by disinvested corporations. 

In response to the furious reactions from publishers, Asda has released statements, implying that the e-mail contained their “wish list” and that they are expecting to go to the negotiating table.  Asda claims that when the publishers bring their own list of demands, a compromise will be reached.  But as they prepare to take their seats at the bargaining table, I would implore publishers to stand together against a particularly suspect infringement upon their autonomy and to remember that walking away from the bargaining table is always an option.

32 comments | Jul 22, 2008

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Just one day after this release chronicling Wal-Mart’s continuing reputation problems and the impact they have on the company’s business, a new study from the UK shows Wal-Mart’s branding is struggling overseas as well.

The Superbrands Council conducts an annual poll surveying the top UK brands. According to the group’s website, “Every year we commission an independent research process that asks a panel of experts and thousands of consumers their opinion on literally every major UK brand.” The survey included a wide range of consumer brands and ranked them according to respondents’ impressions of the company.

Wal-Mart’s wholly-owned UK subsidiary, Asda, dropped a whopping 253 places since last year’s survey, and came in a lowly #439 out of 500 companies, directly behind Kentucky Fried Chicken.

As we mentioned yesterday, the company’s continuing reputation for low wages, employee mistreatment, unethical sourcing and environmental damage undoubtedly contribute to its low scores in surveys such as this. It’s in Wal-Mart’s best interest to improve its brand quality from the bottom up, raising wages for its lowest earning employees and taking responsibility for its social impact all along its production chain.

Google ‘UK’s top consumer brand’ [BBC News]
Official Top 500 Superbrands 2008/09 (PDF) [Superbrands]
Wal-Mart’s Reputation Problems Continue [Wal-Mart Watch Press Release]

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