Stockboy's™ Retail Storm

Confessions of an ex Assistant Manager

2008-10-06T05:08:00.000-07:00

Valli A. writes in the PaperBack Swap forums (free registration required):

"I worked upper management for two years at Wal-Mart. You would not believe the horrific things I've seen.

I was once reamed out for hiring a deaf guy. I was told that once I start hiring handicapped people, then they would force Wal-Mart to provide all kinds of expensive equipment for them to use. I once had to force a brand new mother into working 22 hours straight because her department was not quite ready for inventory when I could easily have pulled other department managers from their ready departments to help her. Her department wasn't ready because she'd JUST come back from maternity leave. She did not get paid extra for all those hours. I was once asked to put off my own son's birthday party because some district manager was unexpectedly coming. They called me at home the morning of the party and demanded that I be there in an hour. Needless to say, I became a stay at home Mom that very day!

The main store manager gets a huge yearly bonus if his yearly wages are under the mark. I was constantly lowering the amount of employees on the floor for him to get this bonus. Then, I'd have to make the salaried department managers work extra hours to do things they should have had employees to do for them. So, next time you can't find an employee to help you there, don't get aggravated. Just think how nice it will be for the store manager to get that fat bonus check!

There are lots of things that even the regular, hourly employees of Wal-Mart don't know. I'm not naive, I know that all companies operate for profit, but Wal-Mart goes overboard to present itself as a friend to the community. In reality, they are a community's worst enemy."

Guess they skipped over Valli's store on the Wal-Marting Across America tour.

Wal-Mart Ownes Lowes?

2007-10-27T17:05:00.000-07:00

This rumor has been going around for some time now and I would like to say for the record that this is most definitely, probably, most likely not true. Yeah they look a lot alike and they smell the same but from what I have read on the web I can say, nahh, not true.

Home Depot on the other hand ... nah just kidding. :)

In My Opinion

2007-03-29T18:01:00.000-07:00

As a reminder this site is a site of OPINION and solely the opinion of the author. I do not care to keep reminding people who are emailing me demanding proof of this and that. The last time I checked this was still the United States of America where Freedom of Speech was still considered a RIGHT under our constitution.

I work for Wal-Mart and as an employee I have the unique opportunity to voice my opinion as an insider. With that said I will now continue offering my OPINION.

Thank You,
Stockboy™

Area 71

2007-03-14T19:46:00.000-07:00

Area 71 is the unofficial title for Wal-Mart's 125,000-square-foot datacenter which is located in Caverna, Missouri right across state lines from Arkansas. The datacenter has a supposed capacity of over 460 terabytes of data, or 460,000,000,000,000 bytes of data.

Area 71 is built directly on top of bedrock which gives it maximum strength to withstand many natural and man made disasters. It is also self sufficient with generators and the capability to retain data link with the Wal-Mart network using copper wire, fiber optic cable, or satellite communications.

Some speculate that the datacenter was created to link video footage with customers buying products to build a database as to when and what kind of person buys a certain product. It can also be used to develop trends in purchasing before major events (i.e. natural disasters, holidays) so that Wal-Mart executives can better stock store shelves in anticipation of this event.

Wal-Mart also uses Area 71 to control many functions of Wal-Mart stores. This includes but its not limited to turning the lights on and off, adjusting the climate control, and playing the in store music. Also run from the data center is the computer system that employees use to “clock in” at each location and also provides email to keep employees informed of events that are pertinent to their job function.
Source Wikipedia:

The Writing on The Wal

2007-02-16T01:48:00.000-08:00

My personal thanks goes out to the author of "The Writing on the Wal" for acknowledgement of this blog. The Writing on the Wal offers a wealth of information about the ongoing struggle that all Wal-Mart associates are going through right now and some of the better News articles regarding Wal-Mart and the retail industry as a whole. I visit there myself quite often myself as the site is updated frequently.