Part 1 of 11
[Announcer] Please give a warm welcome to Lee Scott, our President and Chief Executive Officer, Walmart Stores, Incorporated.
[Lee Scott] Whoa! Thank you. Thank you. Alright, alright. Every year ... okay, okay ...
It would be a pleasure for anybody to be the CEO of this company because you know it doesn't matter if you're Sam Walton or you're David Glass or you're Lee Scott, when you come to this meeting, year after year, you get to say, "We had record sales, we had record earnings, we had record reinvestment back into our company." ...
But you know I say all that, but let me tell you my friends you better be ready to be better because today, for whatever reason, whether it's our success or our size, Walmart Stores, Incorporated has generated fear if not envy in some circles. And that makes it more important than ever that we focus on doing the right thing, in doing things right every time. ...
There's two things that we should do: No. 1 is tell the Walmart story, get the message out there....
And the second thing is stay the course. Walmart is too important to individual families who are stretching a budget, we're too important to the suppliers who employ millions of people, we're too important to our associates for whom we have so much love and value so much. And your company will continue to demonstrate our citizenship as a good employer and a member of the communities we serve so well around this world. Ladies and gentlemen, I promise you this: we're going to stay the course, and this company is going to continue to grow.
Middlefield, Ohio.[Don Hunter] Actually, H & H started in 1962, it started on Main Street in Middlefield, a little country store that at that time we were starting a family and it was pretty difficult to know, it was a big decision, and my brother-in-law and I decided we were going to take that step, and we went into business.
UNITED STATES POST OFFICE, MIDDLEFIELD, OHIO. [Don Hunter] We started in a little one-room building that had a full basement, but we did all of our plumbing in the basement, but the upstairs retail area was very small. And we were there for a year and a half to two years, and then we moved on to a larger store in a shopping center and spent several years there, and proceeded in 1992 to build this facility here.
Turnkey Grand Openings. [Don Hunter] This gentleman here happens to be my son. He's been my right-hand man for many many years. It was much easier to retire in '96 when he was here to take over.
[Jon Hunter] One of the biggest parts of our store, being out in a rural area, is what we call the hardware section, the nuts and the bolts and the nails and all types of fasteners. That's always been good because a lot of the farmers are always mending machinery and things around the farm. And the kids that were in here when I was growing up in here, now they've got families and they come in here for the fix-it-up things.
[Jeremy Hunter, son of Jon Hunter] Ever since I was eight I'd come down on Friday nights and after school, and work till nine.
[Matt Hunter, Son of Jon Hunter] I've worked here since I was six. I swept or helped customers when I was young too. At the end of the day, grandpa would give us pocket change. I spent a lot of late nights in here, too. Especially when we were building it.
I HUNT BLUETICKS. I'M A COON HUNTER.
FREEDOM WILL BE DEFENDED.
SPORTSMEN FOR BUSH 2004. [Johnny Faenza] I generally arrive here about 7:15 in the morning, and I unlock the door. I come in and turn the lights on and I get the day money for each drawer in the registers, and I open up the registers. And usually at that time, Tom is here, and Tom goes ahead and kind of tidies up the front of the store and sets out the American flag and the benches for our customers to sit on. And a lot of times the Amish fellows on their way to work will stop here for things that they need, for their day's projects so they'll come in and get plumbing or electrical supplies or a lot of times sporting goods. We have a busy sporting goods division.
WAL-MART DESCENDS ON MIDDLEFIELD![Don Hunter] Jon has been preparing for trying to change stock and inventory, keeping in mind basically to stay with surplus. If you can't compete in one area, we're going to stick with something that is not offered ...
[Johnny Faenza] The mass merchandisers to a great extent do not provide excellence in service. I'll use Walmart as an example, and you're really lucky if they have anyone in the plumbing section who knows anything about plumbing.
[Dr. John Bruening] We were trying to get ready for them for the last probably ten years.
[Frank Mormino] We had a meeting with all the guys and explained the purpose of our job, make sure we do everything right and thorough. We explained what Walmart did and what we do that's different.
[Jon Hunter] This book was brought to us by an Amish customer. He's so much against the Walmart movement after reading this book, that he wanted to get some in and start passing them out or sell them to friends for whatever it cost him. So that's basically, I got a few extra ones, he's taken several and has gotten rid of them, and I'm doing the same.
[Don Hunter] Well, I have never been in a Walmart store; I never intend to go in a Walmart store. I've never had the need, and I've never liked their principles. That's not nice to say at all, probably, but I've seen a lot of small communities crucified and forced out, ma and pa operations that have been in business for years that are out on the street. They just had to close their doors, just because of one entity.
And it appears that that is their intent. To come into a community and force everybody out.
[Jeremy Hunter] They did nothing but lay down the frickin' red carpet for them. I know how hard it was for my dad, my grandfather, to build this building on this lot. They went through everything to try and get the commissioners and stuff to allow them to build here. I mean, we got sign issues, they got to be a certain size, we had to make sure we had enough green around the area ...
[Jon Hunter] I'm all for free enterprise, but when you look at the big picture, the people who own the company are the richest people in the world. So in reality, I think they could spread that out. I'm curious to see how much they'll actually give back to the community.
[Dr. John Bruening, Owner, Geauga Vision] To even use American with Walmart in the same sentence, I don't agree with at all. It's like a Chinese company to me, only with American board members.
[Tom Glassburner, H & H Hardware Employee] It's not a mystery, they come right out on record and say they don't buy American.
[Dr. John Bruening, Owner, Geauga Vision] And all they've done is give China a better distribution center where before, they would have had to find contacts, who to sell to and develop their own markets. Now they got a pipeline in everybody's living room by going through Walmart.
[Tom Glassburner, H & H Hardware Employee] I think the government should have more control. You talk about monopolies, if Walmart's not a monopoly, I don't know what is.
[Johnny Faenza, H & H Hardware Employee] I'm not at all in favor of any kind of communism or socialism. I believe that America should always and forever remain free. However, I think there need to be regulations established wherein ... you know, they busted up Standard Oil, and they busted up Ma Bell, but Walmart seems to be going on a rampage through the American economy, and nobody's even paying attention. The logic of it escapes me. And I spend a lot of time thinking about it.
[Dr. John Bruening, Owner, Geauga Vision] Well, I'm a Republican. I'm a conservative. But I'm following very closely what's happening with the unions. It used to be that a union wage was something that everybody would look up at and say, "Wow, he's a union worker, he's making $18 or $20 an hour." I realize that what we're paying our people. We're not union. I'm all for the unions doing whatever they can do, and whether it be Walmart or K-Mart, or any store that's not going to pay a fair wage.
[Johnny Faenza] I'm a staunch American. I love America. It's the finest, freest country in the world. I'd still, at my age, fight and die for this country. But it seems there are things going on within this country, particularly from a business and economic standpoint, that aren't for the good of the people. I mean the people in mass. You know, a small segment of the population is doing well by what's happening, but the greater majority of the people are being made subservient.
[Dr. John Bruening, Owner, Geauga Vision] I mean, Sam Walton, I don't think would be comfortable with the way things are going right now. I don't think this is why he started the store. It wasn't to crush other competition.
[Johnny Faenza] We have people in this town, families who can't feed their children. And families who have the entirety of their belongings in a car and in a trailer, and are spending most of their life in their car or at the mall because they have been evicted from their homes because they can't find work.
[Jon Hunter] I think there are a lot of people who don't realize there are those people in town, too. I mean, you say that's in Middlefield and people say, "Oh, no."
[Johnny Faenza] Exactly. I was dreaming all of a sudden that the people in this town caught on to a great extent, and we were all out in the street protesting. But I think the likelihood of that happening, we'll probably see pigs fly before then.
[Jon Hunter] I put this business plan together with the help of hardware organizations and people, and I went to several different banks to check on some funding. And when I got an appraisal on the business and the buildings, the appraiser actually came in and devalued the building. And here I figured it'd be appreciating after like ten years and he came in with a lower value. And I questioned him, "How can this be?" He said it was inflation. And I said the economy's not great, but it should still be at least holding its value. And he said, "No. any time a Walmart's coming into town, they knock the values down because sooner or later there's going to be a bunch of empty buildings, and none of them are going to be able to sell.
[Don Hunter] Any community on a grand opening is going to see a change, a drop in sales. It happens regardless of whether it's Walmart or someone else. You'll have a drop in sales. So there'll be a dramatic change of some type. How long it will last, it can't last forever because you just can't stand the overhead if you don't have the business. So something has to happen. And let's hope it doesn't come to that point. But you never know.
INVENTORY CLOSEOUT SALE. AFTER 43 YEARS H & H HARDWARE IS CLOSING.[Jon Hunter] Well, right now, after we liquidate product, I'm in the process of trying to sell the ... we own the building so I'm trying to sell the building, as well as get somebody in here that will be able to lease, too. I've got a couple of people on the line right now that want to talk with me within the next couple of days. And hopefully, we'll work something out and sell the property, and I'll be able to pay all my bills and walk away without any debt. That's if it all works out all right. I pray that it will.
H & H HARDWARE.[Weldon Nicholson, Walmart Store Manager Trainer - 17 years) I remember that like it was yesterday. To hell with it, Walmart will buy the damn town. We'll shut them down. And we used to drive through town and was going "Six months, three months, six months" was when we'd be closing them.
We drive up all the way to New York City on Route 80 and you can pull off at Clarion or any of those towns up there, and you'll see a Walmart up on the hill, you'll see a Perkins, maybe a Burger King, and then you'll drive further into the town and you'll see an empty town. It looks like a neutron bomb hit it.
[Al Norman, Founder, Sprawl-Busters] They don't get it. When we start talking about quality of life, they start talking about cheap underwear. I keep saying, "You can't buy small-town quality of life at a Walmart. They don't sell it. But once they steal it from you, you can't get it back at any price."
MAIN.
BLUES ALLEY. DELTA AVE.
HEARNE, TEXAS. [Grace Thibodeaux, Hearne, Texas Resident] We thought that it was the most fantastic thing in the world that Walmart was coming to Texas. I mean, it was like they had bestowed some great honor on the community. And we welcomed them, literally, with open arms. We could not say enough good about them, could not do enough for them, could not help them come ... when Walmart first made the decision to come here, you could come to town on a Saturday evening and not find a parking place anywhere. I came to downtown Hearne on Saturday before Christmas and there was 12 cars in downtown Hearne. I counted 12 cars in downtown Hearne. That is pathetic.
HOYT'S.
BIG PILLOW MOTEL.
SCOTTSBORO GUN & PAWN. WAL-MART DRIVES DOWN RETAIL WAGES $3 BILLION EVERY YEAR[Lee Scott, CEO, Walmart] I think Sam Walton would tell us, just as he did before he passed away, that the number one thing in this company are our associates, and we've got stores that aren't treating associates as well as they should be treated
Port Charlotte, Florida. [Diane DeVoy, Walmart Employee - 6 years] And you know, it's a community college. I didn't have much for anything else. And I was doing really well. I had a 4.0 average. But life happens. My dad got sick, my mom got sick, and things happen. And it just didn't work out the way I thought it was going to. When I started working there, I had so much pride in my job. I did. I didn't mind being there when they needed me. I knew that we were short-staffed. At that time I didn't know it was a purposeful thing, that that's their intention.
[Cathy Nemchik, Walmart Employee - 4 years] They had stacks like this of applications in the back. They just didn't hire them. And then we're told, "We don't know what to do. We don't have the people. We don't have this, we don't have that." And I really did, at first, I felt bad for them. It was like, "Okay, I'll give you an extra hour here, I'll come in early tomorrow, okay I won't take my day off."
[Diane DeVoy, Walmart Employee - 6 years] Always having to stay late. If you're supposed to work till 11:00, you're there till 12:00, 12:30.
[Stan Fortune, Walmart District Loss Prevention Manager - 17 years] Keep the number of associates from being full time, as many as you can. Keep them part-time as much as you can. And just keep reducing that expense.
[Jon Lehman, Walmart Store Manager - 19 years] The Company doesn't allow the stores enough payroll dollars on their budget to get this job done, and this job is enormous. This Company is rolling in, is raking in the dough in sales. I mean, my store alone did over $100 million in sales the year that I left.
[Diane DeVoy, Walmart Employee - 6 years] Having to get up with the kids. Just getting them out to school after four hours of sleep.
[Stan Fortune, Walmart District Loss Prevention Manager - 17 years] They don't care about what you sacrifice. It doesn't matter how many people lose their families. It doesn't matter if the associates have good health care. It doesn't matter -- anything other than what the bottom line profit is for that store that month.
[Jon Lehman, Walmart Store Manager - 19 years] It just makes it really difficult to have a good family life at Walmart.
[Weldon Nicholson, Walmart Store Manager Trainer - 17 years] You know, if you can squeeze every dime out of them, you go for it. And it doesn't matter what happens to their families, if they fall apart, if they get sick. You know, to hell with them.
[Lee Scott, CEO, Walmart] We're troubled by the fact that there are people who work full-time who in fact cannot provide enough for their families to live decently.
[Diane DeVoy, Walmart Employee - 6 years] It was just impossible for me to pay my bills, pay for daycare, and work. The money that I did get went right back into Walmart. I get my check, have it deposited, go shopping. When I first started at Walmart, I had my kids on the Walmart insurance. It got to the point where it was just too much for me to handle, I just couldn't afford it. I'd have to pay my premiums at work, and then when I took them to the doctors, I still had to pay. I always had to pay a chunk of money.