Posted on 04/27/2011 6:58:06 PM PDT by Altura Ct.
NEW YORK (CNNMoney) -- Wal-Mart's core shoppers are running out of money much faster than a year ago due to rising gasoline prices, and the retail giant is worried, CEO Mike Duke said Wednesday.
"We're seeing core consumers under a lot of pressure," Duke said at an event in New York. "There's no doubt that rising fuel prices are having an impact."
Wal-Mart shoppers, many of whom live paycheck to paycheck, typically shop in bulk at the beginning of the month when their paychecks come in.
Lately, they're "running out of money" at a faster clip, he said.
Wal-Mart's ready to do battle on prices
"Purchases are really dropping off by the end of the month even more than last year," Duke said. "This end-of-month [purchases] cycle is growing to be a concern.
Wal-Mart (WMT, Fortune 500), which averages 140 million shoppers weekly to its stores in the United States, is considered a barometer of the health of the consumer and the economy.
To that end, Duke said he's not seeing signs of a recovery yet.
With food prices rising, Duke said Wal-Mart is charging customers more for some fresh groceries while reducing prices on other merchandise such as electronics.
Wal-Mart has struggled with seven straight quarters of sales declines in its stores.
(Excerpt) Read more at money.cnn.com ...
As IF!
Note that gasoline gets the blame....
NOT:
Rising food prices...(With the bonus smaller portions!)
...rising paper products prices...(they get you coming and going!)...
...Yeah, the products on the wall over by the personal hygiene stuff, (the coming part)...
Actually, not too much in the whole store is cheaper, maybe because they have been burning gasoline in all the diesel rigs that bring the stuff.
Sure, gasoline is up, too, but the only falling prices around here (long before that) weren't hung on the sign right.
“We’ve paid our dues”
Lots of people pay and are going to get nothing. Whatever you get in SS, deserved or not, it most definitely is NOT a “return on investment”.
Your SS check comes out of the same tax receipts/deficit spending as every other government expenditure.
While offensive to you, SS and welfare are a lot closer than you think, and at some point in the future are likely to be one and the same.
Nobody ever said “thank you” to you when they took your taxes, but that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t have compassion for those that work hard, pay taxes, yet must struggle today.
So take your check, spend it, enjoy it, but don’t try to claim it’s a return on investment. It’s not, and it’s beeen decided in court that it is not.
When you see Donald Trump in Wal-Mart, we’ll all be in trouble...
Why doesn’t Wal-Mart just open the doors and give everything away those evil bastards?
Signed, President Barry and his entourage
There are newly poor in America. It used to be nouveau riche. Thanks, Barack, you are destroying the middle class.
floriduh voter to Keith in Iowa Gas is highest in Chicago. Obama was just there seeing Oprah and no doubt, Rahm (I bet Rahm is still helping Bambi). I also think Obama picks up substances in Chicago. He goes to Chicago just enough to get resupplied.
floriduh voter to GatorGirl Government checks also come out in the middle of the month. It’s not the case any more that they issue at the beginning of the month.
floriduh voter to blackdog
I cut back on Walmart when they began hiring employees who could speak Spanish but couldn’t speak English. That required two employees: one who couldn’t speak English and a translator. Whatever partnership Walmart made with non-English speakers was not publicized but I experienced it and I want Americans to be employed, not just anybody.
floriduh voter to HamiltonJay Target funds Planned Parenthood. Yes, I used to shop at Target too but not instead of Walmart. At least when Target puts things on clearance, they really mark things down.
floriduh voter to TSgt Barack Obama’s so out of touch that he it didn’t occur to him that even POOR PEOPLE DRIVE CARS. He was going to hand “the poor” the country on a silver platter. Not so much.
floriduh voter to floriduh voter; All
Citizens strapped by gas prices are splitting BOGOS at
grocery stores and are not buying much of anything else but the bare necessities around here. A friend of mine gave her friends Hess gift cards for Easter so they could fill up.
People are sharing, gifting w/gas cards and staying home instead of drivin' to the big box stores. People are going to the closest to home places in spite of smaller selections of goods instead of to the biggest store.
I wonder what a chart of “cell phone plan (with unlimited texting/data) participation” would look like if imposed over said chart. Wait... I really don’t want to know.
That’s the thing about the Free Trade Race To The Bottom. Sooner or later, you can’t import goods that are cheap enough to make up for the wages lost to dirt-cheap foreign labor. So it goes.
In my area no one in Walmart speaks English. When I shop there I feel like the foreigner.
I do. My fully taxed, non-government pension check comes on the first. My partially taxed SS retirement check comes much later.
... I occasionally shop for some of my groceries at Wal-Mart. I never cease to be amazed at overweight people there with overweight children buying unhealthy, fatty, junk foods.
Here here!
And may I add a “Thanks so much for the socialist, vote buying, entitlement program that I’ve been forced to pay my entire working life only to perpetuate Karl Marx’s failed ideas so that you can have a false sense of security,” to that too.
Same here in ga except one time a saw a BF who used an EBT card drive away in a mercedes SLK ($50,000). You can always tell who's going to use EBT cards. The beer, wine, and pet food are always piled separately from the steaks and frozen dinners.
And this is why communism does not work.
Our local Mega WalMart has 3 or 4 registers open out of about 25. The customers are 6 to 10 deep. A company that brings in that much money can’t afford to hire a couple more people for $9 an hour? (or whatever they pay)
I’ve walked out of WalMart from being disgusted at the long lines a few times. That’s probably $50 worth of stuff bought elsewhere each time. I rarely go there anymore.
Electronic Benefits Transfer. The old food stamps were a booklet of coupons. The new food stamps are a debit card that gets reloaded with cash each month. They made the change to reduce the stigma of using food stamps. It looks like a credit/debit card so onlookers can't tell who is on food stamps.
Here is a California EBT card
They SURE got the "Advantage" as in taking Advantage part correct on the label of the card.
Excellent, festusbanjo! I'm going to remember that one.
OK, FYI: here's the actual definition for those EBT (food stamps) cards:
Even mega-low prices WalMart NOW feeling the pinch of gasoline prices.
My thoughts exactly.
Well, it's accurate in a way. The first of the month is when they get my paycheck.
The so-called "pinch of high gas prices" is a load of manure. Just do the math. I'll take me as an example I commute 160 miles a week, plus drive another 50 or so miles on the weekend. My vehicle averages 19.23 mpg for around town driving or 10.92 gallons a week. My wife's car gets 15 mpg around town, but she only drives 60 miles per week. so another 4 gal per week. So together we're paying roughly $15 per week more than we did last year. BFD. One large pizza & fixins.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.