The image bargain

International The world's largest 
Grocery retailer Wal-Mart is now also targeting fewer
price-sensitive groups of buyers and reaches them with its own
TV network receives 138 million customers every week.for decades, Wal-Mart, the
trading giant in Bentonville, Arkansas, is to offer its business partners a
modest atmosphere. Regardless of whether it is the boss of a
lawnmower dealer or the largest entertainment company in the world.
world. Until a year ago, the "Wal-Mart experience" was available to all
visitors in equal measure from a cool waiting room ambience and thin
Coffee. This is now a thing of the past, as last June the
Business Center "Wal-Street" finally a suitable space
where Wal-Mart's suppliers can make their presentations in style.
and there are also signs of improvement when it comes to coffee.

Long-term repositioning
The welcoming gesture towards his business partners is just one
element in a large-scale image overhaul that Wal-Mart
is currently going through. "Wal-Mart has an image problem," says Mark
DiMassimo, CEO of brand consultancy DiMassimo Brand Advertising. "And that
is a hindrance to further growth plans."

In the meantime, the ongoing attacks by the
Trade union representatives who accuse the company of
exploit employees, and the increasingly fierce competition from
retail giants such as Target. In order to maintain the current
successfully manage the transition phase, the marketing department, which
has a budget of one billion dollars, has been expanded and expanded to
260 employees. An image campaign is to be launched next year
follow

The colossus is addictive
However, business is anything but bad. 30 percent of all
Americans shop according to a single criterion:
inexpensive products. And no retail chain has lowered prices so far
down like the retail giant from Bentonville. "The
Wal-Mart's strategy is simple: to sell goods as cheaply as possible.
possible and to sell them as cheaply as possible," says
Bill Cody, marketing professor at the Wharton School of the University of
Pennsylvania. "Their slogan is: 'Always low prices'. And so
they do the same."

Wal-Mart, according to observers of international trade,
can change an entire economy, at least in those countries where it
are successful, such as in Mexico, England or Canada. "Wal-Mart has
made trade in Canada more efficient, drove those trading companies that
were not competitive, into bankruptcy and comes to the customer with
its awards," says Karl Moore, professor of marketing at the
McGill University in Toronto.

This has both positive and negative consequences for suppliers: "They get
huge orders, but with low profit margins," says Moore.
"You have to be careful because Wal-Mart keeps pushing prices down.
down, and smaller producers will quickly be taken over by them.
dependent." For this reason, according to a study by the
Consulting firm Bain & Company a maximum of a quarter of its goods
to Wal-Mart.

However, Bain consultant Marc-André Kamel believes that a
supplier that works with Wal-Mart, in more ways than one.
"Don't work against Wal-Mart," he warns. Rather, you should
aligning its own marketing strategy with Wal-Mart and advertising
switching together with the partner. Kamel gives the following example
of the household goods manufacturer Clorox, which also sells barbecue charcoal.
Consumer studies have shown that customers who buy coal also
take more meat home with them. So Clorox advertised its coal
with advertising clips from barbecue festivals and set up barbecue stands on the
Wal-Mart parking lots. With success: sales for coal as well as for
meat rose dramatically. "When you take actions like this
Wal-Mart can support you in this," concludes Kamel.

The 7-dollar jacket
Wal-Mart also expects to cooperate with its customers on another level.
suppliers. To get the cheapest prices for customers,
Wal-Mart forces manufacturers to pay all unnecessary costs - from labor costs,
administration through to sales - as far as possible. On
This way you can sometimes get a pair of Levi's jeans for less than 20
dollars - in some stores for 9 dollars - or a blazer for 7
dollars. The so-called in-store brands are particularly inexpensive,
Wal-Mart's own brands - such as in-house computer models with
pre-installed "Lindows" operating system, which are available from 200 dollars.
are. 

But the bosses of the US supermarket chain no longer want to go it alone.
rely on the low-cost strategy and prevent a possible
growth slump by courting new groups of buyers:
Consumers in higher income groups, for example. For this reason
The new Wal-Mart stores will offer products such as
Flat screen televisions, food from organic farming, more expensive
wine varieties or designer goods. Especially those skeptics who
Wal-Mart have so far ignored and avoided on principle, are to be
be convinced. According to Eduardo, the aim is to
Castro-Wright, CEO of Wal-Mart Stores, "the shopping experience to
improve", but without falling into the luxury category.
want

In its restructuring efforts, Wal-Mart can rely on a
unique marketing tool: his own
In-House-TV-Network, which was launched in 1997 and offers advertising for the
supplier companies. The company recently started new
Introduce plasma screens that are installed at eye level.
"The commercials run on over 100,000 in-store TV screens and
reach 138 million customers per week throughout the world in this way.
country," explains Wal-Mart Communications Director Karen Burk. This is
more than any other TV event on American television,
including the Superbowl, which has a share of 90 million
viewers reached.

Customer acquisition via in-house TV network
Another tool that Wal-Mart can use for marketing purposes,
is its extensive collection of customer data. According to company estimates
the company has now generated 460 terabytes of data since 1991.
collected - more than any other retail company. For comparison:
The Internet has access to only half of such data volumes,
estimates the New York Times. "Only the US government has more data
available," says Bill Cody. He believes that only this data
Wal-Mart to its dominant position. "Everything runs
to data collection."     
     

Gerti Schön

Company profile
Wal-Mart was founded in 1962 by Sam Walton and today employs
over 1.8 million employees worldwide. The approximately 3900 stores in
the USA (Wal-Mart Supercenters and stores, SAM's Clubs and
Neighborhood Markets), there are a further 2700 stores in 9 countries.
countries. Majority shareholdings in retail chains with over 700
Stores in 6 other countries are listed separately. Without the latter
In the past financial year, the Group generated 312.4
billion US dollars, an increase of 9.5 percent compared to 2004.
corresponds.

 
Luca Aloisi