Yep, Mana....
(Of course, it also goes without saying that a free people can make up their own minds about where they wish to shop, or not shop. There was an interesting NYT piece last week about COSTCO --- still linked on their front page, I believe --- that illustrated the somewhat different path COSTCO has chosen for itself... It pays well above the prevailing wages, and offers much better company health care for one example [& so benefits from MUCH lower hiring and retraining costs then it's competitors like Sam's Club or Walmart... people strongly desire to stay at COSTCO and make careers out of it]. Although it's management squeezes it's suppliers just as hard as Walmart to get low prices [an example was given of it dropping a vendor who wasn't giving it the same, or better, price then it was giving Walmart... :)] Another business choice it has made is to carry a somewhat SMALLER line of merchandise then Sam's Club... but to support those products in the after-market better, or for longer. Perhaps as a result, COSTCO has a HIGHER AVERAGE PER-CAPITA INCOME in it's customer base then it's competitors do.)
All choices.
Incidentially, back to Walmart: I expect (if China continues to re-value it's currency higher over the next few years) that Walmart will CONTINUE it's low-priced strategy... but will likely shift it's sourcing to lower-cost locales, Vietnam, India, Bangladesh, Burma, where ever.... |
