Posted on 01/01/2006 1:16:56 PM PST by BenLurkin
NEW YORK (AP) -- Wal-Mart Stores Inc., which made a big push this holiday season to woo customers with aggressive discounts and marketing, estimated that its December sales will meet only the low end of its forecast.
The world's largest retailer said Saturday that sales at stores open for at least a year, known as same-store sales, are expected to be up 2.2 percent in December. The forecast was for a 2 percent to 4 percent gain. Same-store sales are considered the best indicator of a retailers' health.
The company said that general merchandise sales outpaced demand for food.
Wal-Mart, which stumbled during the holiday 2004 shopping season, came out with a holiday campaign two weeks earlier than last year. The retailer had a solid start to the season, but like many merchants, struggled with shoppers delaying their purchases longer than last year.
Wal-Mart, whose gift card sales beat expectations this season, is counting on a big sales boost in January from gift card redemptions. Gift card sales are recorded only when customers redeem them.
To entice customers with the newfound money to splurge on regular-priced goods, Wal-Mart rushed in new spring assortments and new outerwear for the day after Christmas. Meanwhile, it pushed discounted holiday goods to the back corner.
Wal-Mart and many other major retailers are expected to announce their final December results on Thursday.
1. Yes, I am sure you can.
2. They inject their poultry with sodium because it is garbage.
3. I don't understand the last part of your post. Apparently I hit a nerve?
Some people will defend the actions of others blindly. WalMart is treating the lowest quality food with several different sodium derivatives and selling it at above what it is worth. Poisoned food at a high price. Some people don't care, I guess.
Zowie. Apparently someone on here is an avid walmart fan, eh?
They've got the best salmon around.
Fresher and better tasteing than Safeway or KingsSooper, our only other two choices.
We seldom shop WalMart, but Castle Rock, and north Colorado Springs have clean stores.
They have the best, freshest salmon around.
Uh oh, very bad news. That's gonna leave a mark.
As far as the intent of the original post--I think shoppers played a big fat game of "chicken" with retailers this year. They waited to see how low would prices go before buying! And I don't know about stores in your area, but this last week every store I went into was packed to some unseemly level, much worse than ever before Christmas. I suspect everyone was cashing in those gift cards!
And some people will attack the actions of Wal-Mart blindly. Have fun, union troll.
Ask ANY reputable butcher about WalMart meat, poultry and seafood. Like I said earlier; some people don't care. Their choice.
I don't anymore.
I thought the season looked slow also.
If you've ever been to Katy, Texas, from whence I suspect our Wal-Marter hails, you'd understand . . . for the longest time, that was all Katy had.
That, and a broken-down Pinto on I-10 at the Grand Parkway exit.
Plus they deliver Sat, Sun and Holidays!
You could almost say walmart is as American as apple pie and baseball. If it werent for the fact most of the money goes overseas to red China. But hey, who cares?!
(...and I am tempted to ask what departments the walmarties work in. heehee)
the local Wal-Mart cut prices on some of the special items just before Christmas. They had a 23 inch color TV for only $75. I didn't need one but at that price, I bit.
So you're saying that WalMart doctors their food products? I seriously doubt Perdue or Tyson or any of the other poultry companies would be selling their products to WM if that were the case.
And I know that WM is getting their oysters from the same shucking houses as other local grocers.....same jars. In fact I've seen the same brand in WM as I have at area seafood markets. I don't buy seafood in WalMart, or any other supermarket for that matter, I buy it directly from the folks who catch it or know who caught it, but that has been my observation.
King Soopers! Actually, it's just confusing. What does it mean? Soup? Who knows.
Back to the salmon. My wife does the shopping, so I didn't know where the salmon came from. One time I commented that the salmon was FAR better than any we had for a long time. She told me she had missed Safeway on the way home, and so just stopped at Walmart, something she seldom does.
Anyway, after that we usually get it from WalMart, which is a bit of a hassle, but it's always fresher. Ithink they just sell more of it, and so the turnover is better than Soopers or Safeway.
No, not automatically. But compare the clothes at Chico's FAS to Wally World. Then try repeating that statement with a straight face.
Full Disclosure: I used to buy store-brand blue jeans, but noticed they wore out far more quickly than some name brands, and about the same as other name brands. The best value for me was figuring out the (price / average-time-to-holes) ratio to tell me the cost per month of each brand of jeans. Your mileage may vary.
I didn't know Wal-Mart was anti-Christmas. I don't shop at Target because they no longer have the Salvation Army bell ringers. Wal-Mart still allows the Salvation Army.
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