Why my next lawn mower will be a Snapper
 

The man who said no to Wal-Mart

And a related story:

The Wal-Mart you don't know

Walmart will ultimately be very bad for our economy. They continue to drive down prices, which drives down quality and forces outsourcing.

My father has worked for several dairy plants, and hates supplying their grocery division. They implement standards on the plants that makes it difficult to turn profit. He said the yrequire the machinery to be clean enough to eat off of, meanwhile you walk into the average Walmart and it's a dumpy, dirty, mess.

I refuse to shop there. Besides the fact that they sell mostly crap, I don't support what they're doing to the retail world.

Capitalism at its best. I don't mind what Wal-Mart does, but I don't like to shop there for other reasons. They sell mostly crap, they are always full of the scum of the earth people, and its always CROWDED.

Didn't read the story, but would like to weigh in supporting Snapper. Those puppies rock.

EDIT: Oh, they're talking about push mowers. Eff that, there's hardly a dimes diff between push mowers. The engines are all Tecumseh, Briggs and Stratton, or Yamaha, and the decks and wheels are generally some variant on the Murray schematic. That said, my dad's old snapper push is a decently designed forged aluminum deck, . . . with a Techumseh engine replacing the B&S that crapped out long ago.

Ill add that customer service is all but a thing of the past. Try to find someone in a hardware dept. of Wal-mart that treated you like the mom and pop Hardware store owner walmart put out of buisness.

My wife and I have had an up and down relationship with Wally World. We went from driving around with a "Wal-Mart SUCKS the life out of your town" sticker on our car to my wife working as a fashion designer for the corporate offices in Bentonville.

It was certainly a test of our beliefs. While we never really "bought in" to the Wal-Mart philosophy, we were forced to, at the least, justify and apologize for the place that wrote my wife's paychecks. We began shopping at Wal-Mart again. We bought in to the stock options. My wife kept the long hours and made the commute. Then she got pregnant. Thankfully she was able to quit Wal-Mart and take a job working as a designer out of our house. Slowly but surely, we've been able to filter Wal-Mart out of our lives again. We no longer shop there on a weekly basis, choosing to buy our groceries from a local, employee-owned grocery store instead. We occassionally go to Sams still for diapers and formula, but we'll likely not renew our membership once this one expires. As for the stock options, I'm still hanging onto them. Once the stock hits 55 a share again, I'll dump them as well.

I'm not going to get into the good and evils of Wal-Mart, but I'll just say that my own conscience is much clearer now that I don't shop there. I literally dreaded going to the grocery store when we shopped there. Now that we go somewhere else, it's actually a fun excursion for our family.

I quit shopping there, but not because of some moral indignation. I quit because the one in Liberty sucks donkey balls. There are never enough cashiers working at peak times - for example, I've gone there after work to just pick up a random item or two (6 or 6:30 PM) and the place will be packed - with what looks like 75% of the registers closed. They never enforce the 20 items or less in the express lane. They continually allow people haggling over pennies to hold up lines. There ought to be a 20 item limit at the self checkout too.

I pretty much buy everything at Target now. They have better stuff, there is a lot less WT, and you never wait behind more than one person in line. Plus the store is always clean and shelves are organized.

They've done a great job designing their stores. You go into Wal mart and it's just some huge building that looks like an airplane hanger, with sterile, cheap flourescent lighting, everything is drab and unemotional. It reinforces the feeling that what you're doing is a chore. At Target at least you feel like you're in a nice place and are surrounded by pleasing aesthetics.

I dumped Walmart because Target gave me a better value. I know Target is still a huge evil corporation that is de debbil and eats teh babbies but whatever. They give me a service that I value above all their competitors. I can get everything I need in one place and for a decent price.

I'm sympathetic to mom and pop operations, but at the same time, the economy is evolving, the model is always changing, and people need to be ready to adapt to it. Nobody is still selling covered wagons and decrying the public's decision to use automobiles as harmful to the economy and putting the little guy out of business.

The push mower was just mentioned as an example of their low-end priced mower. I agree, fug that push mower shit. They also have self-propelled models, and they're all American made.

I was differentiating between push [all walk-behind, all generally alike], and RIDING mowers [Snapper = teh shizz].

If you want to talk about riding mowers, then I'd opt for something more like this:

Denver girls dress up to go to WalMart.

FAX

I've been doing major grocery shopping (the full-cart stuff every 2 weeks) at the Wal-Mart Supercenter they opened here over a year ago. I save a lot of money over shopping at Publix or Kroger. But I must admit, it's beginning to depress me, despite the savings.

I can't stand the people. I'm sorry, that's elitist and snobby, but I'm just sick of seeing people 100 pounds overweight and a bunch of folks in those little scooters clogging the aisles.

The store has become kind of dingy and shabby. Some shelves have barren spots that they haven't restocked. And the quality of the meat and produce is subpar.

This Saturday is "big shopping day" as we call it in the family. I'm thinking of trying to talk the wife into hitting Publix for old-times' sake. And for my sanity.

:clap:

When we moved to a town with a Super Wal-Mart, we started shopping there. We found we could save around $30 on our grocery bill each week. But the quality of produce and meats as well as the slobs standing in the middle of the aisle staring lazilly have caused me to go elsewhere. I won't even mention standing in lines. Just two weeks ago I left a full cart in line at 10:00 on a Saturday morning. There was one checker working and ten standing at the money counter with their fingers up their rears. I will not spend another cent in any Wal-Mart ever again even if it means spending twice each week on groceries.

We shop at Hy-Vee for groceries, Ace for hardware, and Target and Farm and Fleet for the things we can't at the others. Wal-Mart is too dirty, has crappy help, and their perishable groceries stink.

BTW,
PBS had a great piece on Frontline about the impact of Walmart. It seemed fairly even-handed and viewed the issue from a lot of angles. Check it out, if you can.

What's ironic is that I find Sam's Club steaks among the best out there. Course, the two closest Sam's are brand spanking new and gleaming.