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August 8, 2005
Wal-Mart discovers design
From Sunday's Washington Post - "Pinch Me -- Is That a Wal-Mart?":
Since its founding in 1962, Sam Walton's brainchild has built its business on the traditional-minded lower-income shopper. This is a customer, judging by Wal-Mart's merchandise, who wants the basics -- a sturdy nightgown, a reliable bathing suit, a six-pack of children's underwear. (Wal-Mart sells one of every two pairs in the United States.)
The discount giant has stuck by that consumer, earning billions in the process. But now it is rethinking things -- placing ads in that fashion bible Vogue; having its TV commercials portray a lifestyle, not just a smiley face rolling back prices; even considering hiring a big-name designer. For it has not escaped the attention of Bentonville, Ark., that the rest of the retail world has discovered a different, more lucrative shopper -- one who craves style for style's sake.
. . .
For 43 years, Wal-Mart has been obsessed with individual bargains -- the $24 DVD player, the $12.90 twill jacket -- at times regardless of how they fit in with the rest of the merchandise in the store, or even whether they are in style.
But that singular focus on bestsellers has left the chain without the kind of storewide design aesthetic that has turned rival Target into Tar -zhay, crammed, at every turn of the shopping cart, with bold, contemporary patterns and designs that evoke a lifestyle. And it has left Wal-Mart vulnerable at a time when customers at all levels, even Wal-Mart's basic customers, want fashion.
"We are an item house," concedes Wal-Mart's vice president of product development, Claire Watts, a veteran of Limited Stores, Lands' End and May Department Stores. "But customer expectations require more than great items."
Wal-Mart is trying to move in the direction of Target by establishing a "Trend Office" in New York (Manhattan, no less) to keep up with fashion. But the marriage between "low prices every day" and "cool" may be problematic:
The Trend Office itself is classic Wal-Mart, with penny-pinching touches like fake hardwood floors. The cubicles, tables and chairs are standard-issue from Bentonville. But, in a nod toward the office's fashion ambitions, workers asked to use wall paint a shade brighter than the grayish Wal-Mart white, and to splurge on a set of stools from Design Within Reach. Quotes from Sam Walton cover the walls.
Thus, it is unclear whether a corporate culture built on the mass-production, mass consumption industrial age paradigm of lowest possible prices can make the shift to the information age paradigm of individual fashion statements. Target has so far managed to maintain the balance. It will be fascinating to see if Wal-Mart can.
Posted by Ken Jarboe at August 8, 2005 8:30 AM
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