Their demise is in the horizon although now they seem to enjoy
unprecedented prosperity.
Today, just like many millions of Americans who received
gifts that either didn’t fit or were unwanted, I set out to return a few items.
There were two cans of paint at Home Depot and they were readily exchanged and
I in turn bought an extra gallon of the same color. No hassles, very helpful
and congenial staff.
Then I went to K-Mart to return a pair of shoes because one
was an 8 ½ and the other an 11. I had no sales receipt as it was given to me
but there was a price tag attached and it was clearly a K-Mart label with the
original price of $24.99 reduced to $19.99.
The clerk was polite and asked me for my identification then
she rang it up and she informed me that because it was a discontinued item she
could only reimburse me .50 cents. I then asked to speak with the manager who
also refused to allow me to get a comparable pair of shoes and said that he could
not go against what the computer told him.
I was flabbergasted by this because computers do what people
tell them to do and if one uses common sense and reason then the obligatory
thing for him to do was to tell me to just get a pair and he would have had a
happy customer. But K-Mart would rather keep that $20.00 than give an inch and
so I told him I would never buy anything at K-Mart again as well as telling my
family and friends of this incident.
There is a point that the large American retailer has reached
and it is a regrettable one. Gone are the days when the customer had more
rights, had to be kept happy and public opinion as well as the business image
had to be maintained at the highest possible levels. No more…those days are
gone. They sell in mass lower quality products made somewhere outside of the
United States in sweat shops and they are of very poor quality. I remember just
a couple of decades ago we actually manufactured stuff in America. The city
where I lived – Hialeah had hundreds of small factories and shops that made
some of the best garments and gadgets…all excellent quality and all made with
pride by Americans. We owe it to our DEAR LEADER REAGAN who actually encouraged
and subsidized companies to close their manufacturing and actually move them
abroad all in the name of the fucking profits. Now you can’t find anything of
excellent craftsmanship made in America…all comes from some forsaken third
world country, it is not durable and it took us to the lengths of borrowing
money from the Chinese to buy it. And the Republicans think this is good
business.
Gone are also the days when not only was it a joy to buy at
some of these large retail chains but also it was a great privilege and a
source of pride to go to work for one of them. I remember when working for
Sears was very desirable…employees there had full time jobs with excellent
benefits and they received the respect of their communities. That went out the
window when Sears began hiring part time employees following the trend of most
American corporations to reduce the number of full timers so that they would
have to pay less in benefits like health insurance and vacations.
All this has made Sears go down the tubes…they keep asking
themselves why they are on the decline, why is it that they lost that prominent
place in the shopper’s hearts. K-Mart is near bankruptcy and Wal-Mart may still
be prospering but they also have their days numbered. Each day more and more
Americans like me encounter some stupid action on the part of any of these retailers
and one by one, consumers are being peeled off their customer base.
But
what is yet to come is a time when people realize that some of these
corporations are working against the very public they receive their incomes
from…they donate large amounts of money to ultra-right wing organizations and
politicians as is the case with Wal-Mart and on top of that they pay their
employees lower salaries and offer no benefits…they are arguably one of the
worst employers in America and K-Mart is not far behind.
Three years ago, Wal-Mart ruled for convenience, selection
and price. But today it is losing customers and revenue, and smarting from
decisions that backfired. Wal-Mart is not in danger of ceding its place atop
the retail world. But competitors have begun to chip away at its dominance.
Over the last year, revenue at Wal-Mart stores open at least a year has fallen
by an average 0.75 percent each quarter, according to the International Council
of Shopping Centers. Revenue rose by an average of nearly 1.7 percent at
Target, 8 percent at Costco and 5.9 percent at Family Dollar.
Can you say “BOYCOTT?”
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