Customer Service and Shopping Experience J.C. Penney places greater emphasis on enhancing the overall customer experience, both in-store and online. J.C. Penney's efforts, such as remodeling store layouts with new concepts, improving visual merchandising, and introducing experiential elements, demonstrate that they are looking for methods to enhance the shopping experience (Slaton et al., 2018). However, if done well, this could result in a more enjoyable and memorable experience than Kohl's stores. While J.C. Penney prioritizes experience improvements, Kohl's delivers a superior overall
“Is Wal-Mart Good For America?” affords viewers a thoughtful analysis into the dubious ethical methodologies employed by the Wal-Mart Corporation. Unquestionably, Wal-Mart is not infallible and their strict adherence to low prices has pushed other companies out of business. For example, Rubbermaid, as mentioned in the documentary, fell into Wal-Mart’s paradoxical low pricing trap and forfeited into a merger with a competitor.
‘Is Wal-Mart Good for America?’ On PBS Frontline, May 11, 2015 ‘Is Wal-Mart Good for America?’ is a documentary that examines the relationship between Wal-Mart’s rapid growth and its impact on the US economy ever since it blossomed in trade productivity in the mid 20th century. The documentary, published on February 2014 by PBS Frontline, conveys a deep understanding of how Wal-Mart changed the living standards of many Americans and took consumerism and retail logistics in the U.S. to another level; by cutting costs through offshore outsourcing to China and employing cheap Chinese labor. The documentary focuses on the changing relationship between big retailers and manufacturers and the transition in pricing and decision-making.
In the recent years Walmart has been far our performing its top two competitors; Costco and Target. With a market cap of 212,195,024, Walmart had beaten its competitors who remain at 65,969,279 for Costco and 43,701,237 Target (NASDAQ, Competitors). This means that for Walmart, the total market of all of their goods and services far surpasses its top two market competitors. As investors, you may ask why Costco is second to Walmart’s regarding sales. Well when we take a closer look, we see that “Walmart’s treatment of its customers and employees has not always been then best.
Walmart’s customer service is quite awful; Walmart’s shopping experience has become chaotic and unpleasant for consumers. The employees appear as if they don’t want to be there. The lack of joy and delight in the store is felt in the atmosphere. The employees have attitude towards the customers and little patience for them. When in need of help finding an item or having trouble about anything; none of the employees seem to be there.
Since the company was founded as a corner store, the company’s business plan has always emphasized on expect more, pay less brand promise that sets it apart from its chief rival, Walmart. Although, Walmart is known for its low prices and offers a large selection to its customers; it’s customer service is often found to be nonexistent. This
"Is Wal-Mart Good for America?" gives a provocative examination of the effect Wal-Mart has had on the U.S. economy. The documentary highlights the changing connection amongst makers and the purported "big box" retailers, exemplified by Wal-Mart, that has added to the insolvency of some American organizations and a developing unemployment rate. While Wal-Mart supporters tout the upsides of one-stop, ease shopping, others are frightened at both the outsourcing that has made these low costs conceivable and how extensive retailers influence littler, neighborhood organizations. Cutting edge inspects the champs and the failures as it archives how: Worldwide retailers are superceding makers in settling on choices about item quality, sort and cost.
The company puts a dire emphasis on delivering strong customer service. Their forgiving return policy and friendly employees have coined the company as having some of the best customer service in the large players of the retail industry. To spread their message and explain their formula for customer satisfaction, the book “The Nordstrom Way to Customer Service Excellence.” The publics perception of Nordstrom is generally in good light. This perception also pertains to the 52,000+ employees, as the company takes pride in empowing their employees through a sense of store community and commission bases.
Furthermore, this paper will discuss some proposed solutions to the current ethical issues facing Walmart that could assist Walmart in its objective of continued growth in an ethical and sustainable manner. One of the major ways in which Walmart was able to grow and out compete its rivals was through its ability to provide retail goods to consumers at prices lower than competitors (Ferrell 407). Walmart ability to keep prices low is based on its ability to secure cheaply made goods from foreign manufacturers while also keeping the wages for its workforce low. The combination of cheaply made goods and a low paid retail staff means that Walmart can pass the savings to consumers which made it a popular retail shopping spot for lower to middle income Americans
The major trend within the customer service industry such as retail tends to heading towards more a technology and social media customer service. Given, that online sales has increased within this industry in the past years, which is due to superior customer service over more traditional on site stores. Which has lead Wal-Mart in direct conflict with other major online retailers such as Amazon.com. Whose organizational structure allows for greater managerial and logistic control over their daily business operations. While Wal-Mart, the price leader, offering of free direct shipping to stores and multi media platforms that gives customer online shopping flexibility.
In hindsight I know that Walmart struggles with customer service at most locations dealing with electronics. Using knowledge and bargain techniques my store will be revised to adjust to Walmart. There is no known effect way to beat Walmart so engaging in a price war with them is pointless. Changing or trimming staff to adjust to Walmart is a possibility because Walmart consumes majority of the business where ever they settle. Timing is also important because if I wait to long to adjust my store can suffer financially from not making changes.
We were asked to identify two peer review articles and to examine and detail the economic and/or social benefits/drawbacks of this big box retailer as discussed in these works and to detail how these findings could apply to inform our Walmart scenario discussed in previous modules. The articles I chose focused on two different analysis of Walmart. The first article by Courtemanche (2011), examines the impact of Walmart on body mass index and obesity. It also examines a relationship between the increased cost of medical care due to obesity in contrast to reduced food costs that supercenters deliver and how that affects the bottom line in total household expenditures in a given period. The second article, by Meeks (2011), looks at
Wal-Mart is a powerful and influential grocery store in America and even in the world. It has a good reputation in terms of convenience, variety and good value for money. The greatest strengths of Wal-Mart are “the consumer understanding of low prices, their market clout, their competence in information technology, and their wide store and distribution network” (Internal Analysis of Wal-Mart 2015). The company has built good reputation among consumers during several decades’
Customer satisfaction is at the core of their actions in every step of their supply chain. The company offers different products in their stores, letting the customers decide whether to consume them
The sector is witnessing a radical change as traditional retail markets are replacing with new formats such as discounts stores, departmental stores, hypermarkets, supermarkets etc. In this competitive environment the retailers are more forced to concentrate towards Customer service & their satisfaction. In retail stores, the customer service is includes like counter service, billing the products, offer explanation to customers, providing them coupons, explain the product
