Running Head: Walmart case study

Walmart: The Main Street Merchant of

Doom
1) Following are the Issues that were mentioned in the article
The impact of Walmart on local business where it competes very

successfully in the new locations

The cost saving policies of Walmart which includes purchasing

cheap goods
For being such a big retailer, many people are doubtful about the

revenue of the company

Labour conditions in foreign nations

The four parts of the Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) model are

Economic: A company should be try to increase its profits

Legal: A company must and should obey all laws laid by the

government
Ethical: A company should implement ethical leadership and

management which is a requisite of law

Philanthropy or Discretionary: A company should actively
participate in programs that provides aid to the society

Here this article evaluates Walmart in these four parts in the

following way:

Economic: Walmart with persistent growth is the biggest retailer

Legal: Walmart has a pending issue regarding legal

responsibility, which is the issue of bribery

Ethical: Founder of Walmart respected his employees and visited

the stores frequently

Philanthropy: Walmart donated money to many causes in the
society. This donation in total amounted more than one billion
dollars.

So we can understand that Walmart has successfully maintained

Corporate Social Responsibility by referring to the four parts. Legal is
the only area in which it is lacking CSR because of the allegations of
foreign bribery law violation. These are just allegations and they are
yet to be proved.
In the nature of business, CSR doesnt consider the effect on homegrown businesses as competition. Most of the businesses successfully

Running Head: Walmart case study

amended to have a retailer in their area. Retailer is responsive in
pursuing philanthropy goals by supporting green products. By working
with local governments a retailer can improve its philanthropic output
in improving cities and the area around its stores.
A retailer should not follow unfair competitive practices and should
compete with its competitors fairly. They should leave the decision
making to the consumers.
2) The company founder endowed employees by the following ways, by
looking

at the article:
Providing customer service skills to the employees
Promoting to larger responsibility roles
Employing ethical management

Walmart uses philosophy to teach its employees on how to treat

customers. Walmart promotes low prices which it tells its customers
through marketing campaigns and advertisements and it also promotes
convenient shopping. As the founder of Walmart has passed, it must keep
up with the ethical management policy introduced by him. Walmart can
ensure this by employing ethical store managers who can treat their
employees with respect and will listen to them.
3) Walmarts Buy American program and Environmental Awareness
programs fits into ethical and philanthropic parts of the Corporate Social
Responsibility model. It doesnt have legal or economic requirement for
these programs. Walmart is deeply concerned about its impact on the local
environment and home countrys job. These programs may increase costs
for Walmart.
Walmarts effort for Corporate Social Responsibility should not balance the
impact of the company on competitors and local businesses. It should not
be responsible for failure or success of its competitors, it should be
responsible for fair competition.
4) Stakeholders are those people and groups who may suffer or benefit by
the business operations. The stakeholders are placed in the map as they
relate to the business and the company. The stakeholders of a company
are divided into consumers, employees, owners, community and
government. The stakeholders here to consider are community and
consumers.

Running Head: Walmart case study

Consumers: The dense population is lacking variety of goods which are not
served by many other retailers. So these consumers encourage Walmart to
expand.
Community: the opposition comes from those who think Walmarts value is
opposite to them and they want to save their cultural integrity.
Here, the opposition for Walmart falls under the ideological opposition. The
cultural ideals of opposition and retailer are very different. The cultural
group of stakeholders is against the aspect of consumerism. Walmart can
convince the community group of stakeholders that its ideology is not
based on consumerism but it is accessible to large variety of products for
consumers.
5) Some of the competitors of Walmart are hiring local people to mislead
local governments to prevent the store from expansion by making them
think that Walmart is a threat. This is obviously an unethical practice. And
it is unfair practice with respect to stakeholders of competitors because it
misleads the consumers and misguides government to make wrong
decisions.
6) Till date, Walmart still has been facing criticism in foreign countries
because of its practices. They have even changed many suppliers and
increased study of the supplier labour conditions. Walmarts campaign for
public image has faced some negative feedback from the social media,
even the foreign bribery case has not been proved yet.
7) Criticism shouldnt always be negative. Walmart has grown successfully
despite of criticism, with its ability to sort it out and respond properly to it.
The Insulation by criticism can prevent Walmart from responding to
concerns of stakeholders. A company need to rank their stakeholders
according to companys interests and goals. A successful company doesnt
have to please all the stakeholders, it have to please the important
stakeholders who share common interests and goals.