Walmart is a retail monster in the business working over the oceans and making a major fortune out of it. It’s the universes biggest and the most impacting retailer. Walmart is unquestionably an unpredictable association as it works at an extensive scale over the globe and have distinctive showcasing sections and divisions including in the working procedure of the association.
Walmart particularly has Coordinations, advertising and deals office which are the real piece of the association making this particular retail monster. This kind of approach has empowered Walmart to be more effective in the particular market section by giving administrations to the clients and enhancing our everything client encounter by utilizing their Innovation and Administrations.
There are several strategic challenges also that are faced by Walmart. In case of having to operate in an international market, there is a lot of strategic risk that has to be borne by Walmart. They are vulnerable to political risks, legal requirements, technological changes, economic volatility, changes in value of foreign currency and most importantly international levels of growing competition.
These are some of the most essential elements of strategic risk and challenges that have to be handled and considered by Walmart while functioning in the international markets and business environments.
The main risk in the present scenario is the uncertainty in the economic conditions. Situations like recession and global financial crisis greatly impact the position of a firm like Walmart that is operating on international finance and has to deal with foreign exchange on regular or operational basis.
The change in political and legal conditions or rules and regulations can lead to severe problems for Walmart as there would be intense changes in the polices for offshore, taking away the earnings in foreign currency back to the home country and also in case of fall in value of dollars it can cause Walmart losses of huge magnitudes.
Technology is another extremely essential aspect for Walmart in case of international businesses. Walmart needs a certain level of technological base and support in order to be able to manage its huge supply chain and logistics facilities.
In case of these facilities not being available in some of the countries, Walmart faces several issues and problems regarding managing their supply chain and logistics system. This leads to them needing a strong technological development in a country where they wish to start their business.
Walmart has faced several litigations since its founding on July of 1962. As the United States of America’s largest employer and a multi-billion-dollar corporation with several international locations, Walmart has faced its fair share of litigations through the years. Three examples of the lawsuits that have been fought by Walmart lawyers pertained to employment law, regulating competition or antitrust law, and international law.
In 2005, several individuals from six countries sued Walmart for substandard sweatshop-like conditions at their workplaces. These countries included the United States of America, Bangladesh, Swaziland, Indonesia, China and Nicaragua.
Critics of the company claim that Walmart’s promise of “always low prices,” puts pressure on not just managers of in-store employees, but also pressures the producers selling to Walmart to sell at lower and lower prices. This then incentivizes sellers to cut costs as much as possible, leading to disturbing and unsafe work conditions. (What is the result of this lawsuit).
Another lawsuit case involved the Anti-Trust law. This lawsuit shows how Walmart resolves anti-trust lawsuit against Chicken of the Sea International. Walmart reached an agreement with the Chicken of the Sea International regarding antitrust claims initially brought forth by the retailer back in October 2016, and later amended in May of 2017.
The three largest tuna companies- Chicken of the Sea International, StarKist, and Bumble Bee were sued (along with 53 other seafood companies) for participating in a price-fixing scheme. Price-fixing is explicitly outlawed under anti-trust laws. The case was settled out of court with Chicken of the Sea paying Walmart an undisclosed amount.
According to the lawsuit filed against Walmart on Employment Law, it allows such “pattern and practice” evidence to be used to prove sex discrimination, even when a company has a formal policy forbidding sexual discrimination. After all, every company has a formal policy forbidding sexual discrimination and few affirmatively encourage it in writing. Scalia is unmoved, however.
He asserts that “left to their own devices most managers in any corporation and surely most managers in a corporation that forbids sex discrimination – would select sex-neutral, performance-based criteria for hiring and promotion.” The women of Walmart can’t show that managers exercised discretion in similarly gender-biased ways, he writes, and scoffs at attempts to do so through “statistical and anecdotal evidence.”
Certainly, Walmart is not the only major U.S. retail chain that is being taken to court by its employees. It’s just the one that seems to be taken to court by its employees the most often. Retailers large and small must pay attention to employee legal actions because each legal battle sets a precedent for every retail company in the world doing business in the U.S.
Finally, While Walmart is the biggest grocery player in the U.S., capturing around 14% (as of 2016) of the U.S. grocery market, the combined Amazon-Whole Foods entity accounts for just 1.4% of the market. However, Amazon’s share is expected to rise and command nearly 3% market share by 2021, which would put it behind only Walmart and Kroger.
To fend off this intensifying competition, Walmart has been ramping up its digital initiatives. Online grocery could present a solid growth opportunity for the company going forward, as groceries account for more than 50% of its sales.
Many customers still prefer to buy groceries in person and have been less receptive to the online shift so far, as online grocery sales represented just 3% of total e-commerce sales in 2016. However, the market for online groceries is expected to be among the sectors driving overall e-commerce growth through 2022, as the sector is expected to grow at a 20% CAGR over five years.
Walmart’s market share in 2017 was up to 5 percent in electronics & media. As of the 2018 fiscal year, the company operated more than eleven thousand stores throughout the world and this figure is more than likely to increase as the company continues to expand into emerging markets.
