"Study" shows Walmarts in white areas are 'nicer'

[PokerGuy]

Walmart is bad and I feel bad for going into one. The lines are the longest of any store I've ever been to and when I had a question I was out of luck. No employees in the aisles, no one in customer service. I pushed the button for service and after ten minutes no one came. No savings is worth that.

So your anecdotal experience is representative of thousands of stores?

 

[DrunkenSano]

Not sure how race is a factor in this, it's all about the local job market, and it isn't just Walmart either, I have the same experience as Best Buy. If your local pool of employees comes from a bad neighborhood, don't expect good service. Doesn't matter if they are black or white. Typically, you will find people who are more intelligent, respectful, and articulate in better, wealthier neighborhoods. This has always been the case and always will, has nothing to do with race or Walmart.

 

[hal2kilo]

Not sure how race is a factor in this, it's all about the local job market, and it isn't just Walmart either, I have the same experience as Best Buy. If your local pool of employees comes from a bad neighborhood, don't expect good service. Doesn't matter if they are black or white. Typically, you will find people who are more intelligent, respectful, and articulate in better, wealthier neighborhoods. This has always been the case and always will, has nothing to do with race or Walmart.

I'd give you a thumbs up if that option were still available.

 

[PokerGuy]

Not sure how race is a factor in this, it's all about the local job market, and it isn't just Walmart either, I have the same experience as Best Buy. If your local pool of employees comes from a bad neighborhood, don't expect good service. Doesn't matter if they are black or white. Typically, you will find people who are more intelligent, respectful, and articulate in better, wealthier neighborhoods. This has always been the case and always will, has nothing to do with race or Walmart.

Very well put, that's the bottom line.

 

[Subyman]

Bad read of statistics here to create a racial headline. Wealthier areas have better walmarts and wealthier areas typically have a higher white demographic. This is a socioeconomic issue and had nothing to do with Walmart choosing to give "whites" better stores.

 

[werepossum]

I lived for a year in Chestnut Hill in Philadelphia, right on the edge. Across the street was Montgomery County, and a mile or so down that street was a Pathmark supermarket. It was the nearest/only supermarket in the immediate area. The clientele was 90% plus black, but these were not ghetto blacks, these were solidly middle class blacks in intact families who were employed and owned their own homes, AND THAT STORE was a disgrace.

Now, Pathmark is by no means a high end market, but I'd shopped in several others, all of which were spacious and clean. This one was crowded and unkempt and clearly not tended to, because they could.

OP, it's not that article that's stirring up the race pot, it's real life stuff like this that reminds all too many black folk that even when they do right and climb the ladder to the middle class, they can still be served the shit end of the stick.

I for one absolutely support abolishing laws requiring one to shop at the nearest Walmart rather than the Walmart of one's choice. Only then can black people find true equality and shop at the nice Walmarts.

I am also thinking that I missed my life calling, as studying the niceness of various Walmart stores is clearly why I was put on this Earth. Since Walmart stores vary with time, I could make that a life career. Maybe interspersed with some travel, studying whether majority black or Hispanic areas have cows that tip as nicely.

 

[HamburgerBoy]

Bad read of statistics here to create a racial headline. Wealthier areas have better walmarts and wealthier areas typically have a higher white demographic. This is a socioeconomic issue and had nothing to do with Walmart choosing to give "whites" better stores.

The study factored income disparities and found that they were not nearly as indicative as race.

 

[Exterous]

Beggars cannot be choosers.
The American people are struggling too hard to not "save" under a suffering of poor quality and poor service.
Sacrifices are made every hour of every day with value of labor the way it is.

If there were that many sacrifices being made I would think the BLS surveys wouldn't be showing the hundreds of dollars spent on alcohol and tobacco that are being spent across all income ranges - not to mention the $900-1500 a year spent on 'apparel and (apparel related) services'

The study factored income disparities and found that they were not nearly as indicative as race.

FWIW I very much dislike Walmart but I think it would be pretty difficult for a company of that size and with that big of a target on their backs to pull off deliberate racially biased store conditioning without it having been noticed before. The 'study' fails to mention how it was actually controlled for income and leaves out some pretty important areas when looking at how cities\towns\etc interact. What was the population density like? Where are the Asian comparisons? Whats the distance to the next nearest Walmart? Whats the age of the stores? How do the profits\shrink compare between "poor black" stores and "poor white" stores? If you look at the demographic reports of store shoppers between races there are some differences in store preferences. For example neither Target or Walmart are as frequented by blacks compared to whites. Another big one is whether other large chains similarly experience a drop in Yelp reviews for these areas or not

 

[HamburgerBoy]

FWIW I very much dislike Walmart but I think it would be pretty difficult for a company of that size and with that big of a target on their backs to pull off deliberate racially biased store conditioning without it having been noticed before. The 'study' fails to mention how it was actually controlled for income and leaves out some pretty important areas when looking at how cities\towns\etc interact. What was the population density like? Where are the Asian comparisons? Whats the distance to the next nearest Walmart? Whats the age of the stores? How do the profits\shrink compare between "poor black" stores and "poor white" stores? If you look at the demographic reports of store shoppers between races there are some differences in store preferences. For example neither Target or Walmart are as frequented by blacks compared to whites. Another big one is whether other large chains similarly experience a drop in Yelp reviews for these areas or not

From what Google is telling me, their usage of Yelp ratings covered approximately half of all Walmarts in the USA, which sounds like a pretty fair spread to me.

I agree that a lot of your other points are valid though, and that the study potentially has major issues. The study already implies that it could be very geographical ("Walmart’s poor and differentiated service is consistent with a story in which Walmart’s lower-cost distribution network allows it to enter a market and establish a local monopoly") and have nothing to do with race, and if Walmart is willing to operate in areas where Target, Costco, etc are afraid to, I don't see that as a reason to hate on them. The author of this study is clearly trolling for a hot headline.

 

[werepossum]

From what Google is telling me, their usage of Yelp ratings covered approximately half of all Walmarts in the USA, which sounds like a pretty fair spread to me.

I agree that a lot of your other points are valid though, and that the study potentially has major issues. The study already implies that it could be very geographical ("Walmart’s poor and differentiated service is consistent with a story in which Walmart’s lower-cost distribution network allows it to enter a market and establish a local monopoly") and have nothing to do with race, and if Walmart is willing to operate in areas where Target, Costco, etc are afraid to, I don't see that as a reason to hate on them. The author of this study is clearly trolling for a hot headline.

It's a study based on Yelp ratings. It says a lot more about the quality of academia than about the quality of Walmarts.

Oh, for the good old days where we had studies yielding important results, such as finding that rich people tend to live in larger, more expensive houses than do poor people.

 

[Painman]

Went to the Wal-Mart in Salem MA, a pretty freakin' white town, and it was a filthy trashfest.

OK, the one in Danvers (about 10 miles away) Is comparatively "nice."

 

[soulcougher73]

Walmarts seem to be bad especially in lower income areas. Even newer Walmarts in those areas have much trashier parking lots. Even the Target on Chouteau tfwy is better than most Walmarts.

Yeah i usually stick to Target. Just a better shopping experience and prices are close enough for my wealthy ass to not care

 

[ElFenix]

still nicer than kmart

 

[piasabird]

So what you are saying is white neighborhoods are safer than Black ones. That may actually be statistically true. If it is true, that is not the fault of white people.

 

[NesuD]

http://www.usatoday.com/story/money...t-stores-better-white-neighborhoods/89948300/

By 'study' it means that Yelp reviews were analyzed to determine which stores were nicer...

Anyone with a half a brain can go into various stores (whether it is a Walmart, Target , Walgreen's/CVS or just a mom and pop store) and compare the ones in 'white' areas versus 'people of color' areas to see which ones are nicer....if you think otherwise, maybe you can tell us what the color of the sky is in your world or you should get your vision checked...

This study seems to just blame Walmart for this and nothing else....

Just another article/study to stir up the race pot....

My observation is that there is a lot of truth to this. That said I can speak to what may be part of the reason for this. An affluent suburb near me long resisted a Walmart building there. They put up road block after road block until eventually it required a court order to get approval to build their store. Through the course of that process The municipality would keep making demand after demand for unusual parking configurations, building material required, architectural design requests, and many more that I won't bother listing. In Walmarts quest to get the store built they would end up agreeing to every request so when the court forced the Municipality to allow the project to proceed They had committed to building something far different from the usual Walmart store. I can't say it is like that everywhere but I would expect municipal governments in affluent communities are much more demanding than poor communities that are simply happy to get a store no matter what it looks like.