Dan Abernathy

Courtesy photo

Chinese suppliers make up 70 to 80 percent of Walmart’s merchandise, leaving less than 20 percent for American-made products, according to the Alliance for American Manufacturing.”

Attention Walmart shoppers! This is a disclaimer of sorts, as I plunder into the degradation of entering these wretched stores of disgust. I am not judging or condemning anyone that may lower their standards enough to enter these stores of ill repute. However, be advised that when entering any Walmart store in any town, county or state, you will be forfeiting IQ points that may be needed later in life.

Samuel Walton, 1918 to 1992, founded the Walmart Store in 1962. For a period of time, Walmart Stores Inc. grew to be the world’s largest corporation by revenue as well as the biggest private employer in the world.

Walton became the richest person in the United States. His family has remained the richest family in the U.S. for several consecutive years, with a net worth of around $240.6 billion as of January 2022.

Sam Walton’s dream was to open large discount stores that would be located in rural areas. His idea was that the profits on the items would be small in order to offer the customer a good price. However, he expected to make profit with greater volume.

“Mr. Sam,” as he was known, believed in service and with goals for great value and great customer service. All of which have now been misplaced for profit.

Walmart is a publicly traded family-owned business, as the Walton family controls the company. Sam Walton’s heirs own over 50 percent of Walmart through both their holding company Walton Enterprises and their individual holdings.

The Vanguard Group owns the remaining percentage of Walmart, Inc. They are an American registered investment advisor with about $7.7 trillion in global assets under management. It is the largest provider of mutual funds and the second-largest provider of exchange-traded funds in the world.

Walmart is also changing their name. They are the largest retailer in the world with a huge chain of stores. With the increasing emphasis on e-commerce, as of Feb. 1, it is no longer “Walmart Stores” as it drops “stores” from its legal name.

Walmart once prided itself as being “American Made.” In 2015, after the Federal Trade Commission, which enforces U.S. laws against deceptive ads probed them, Walmart stopped advertising products as “Made in USA,” since they were not.

Chinese suppliers make up 70 to 80 percent of Walmart’s merchandise, leaving less than 20 percent for American-made products, according to the Alliance for American Manufacturing.

China has become so crucial to Walmart’s supply chain that in 2002, the Walton family moved its global sourcing headquarters across the border from Hong Kong to Shenzhen, in southern China.

With all this background setting the stage for these undigested words, if I never walked across the threshold into another Walmart, it would be just fine. I have been to many of these Super Stores and have started to understand that there is no life-force vibrational energy within the plastic based environment.

It matters not, what town, country or state a Walmart may be sitting in, the zombie-like people, referred to as customers are lifeless and only wake up long enough to be rude and hateful. To combat this dilemma of the living dead, Walmart launched their Grocery Pickup Service nationwide.

I was recently asked by a friend to pick up an order for them. This was not a problem as I was planning to step into the den of iniquity anyway. After aimlessly wandering and dodging Walmart employees that were shopping for the Grocery Pickup Service I went to the swinging doors and tried to get the order. I was told without hesitation that this was not how it was done. “Go park your car in the designated parking spot, and call or use the appropriate app.” Slowly I turned, feeling like a scolded second grader, I slowly walked out into the vast parking lot.

Here I found the Grocery Pickup Service area, which had the best parking spots, made the call and waited. I then sat and waited some more as I watched other people drive in and drive out with the beloved shopping list in the trunk. I waited some more before finally walking up to the outside door. Again I was scolded, as this is not how the process was done. I went back to the car and waited. Finally, after about 45 minutes, the jar of Vaseline was brought to the car. Now, it was too late. I could have used the Vaseline before all this that happened, had happened.

I understand why this Grocery Pickup Service could be important as a service for the elderly and disabled, but this is not who I saw using it. It is being used by Americans that are basically lazy, or don’t want to walk into a Walmart anymore. It’s dangerous within this zombie wasteland. It’s not just the will-less people, it is the employed shoppers speed racing around the aisles filling the call-in orders of the people waiting in the best parking spots in the parking lot.

These blue smock clad shoppers are like the contestants in the Supermarket Sweep, an American game show that originally aired from 1965 through 1967. They are rushing without looking and leaving no space for the inside shopper trying to get to the checkout stations. Here, amidst the unoccupied cash registers, are the two checkers who are feverishly working for the long lines of people refusing to give Walmart free help with the self-checkout station.

But, trying to make something good out of something bad, I focus on feeling better for walking out of a Walmart with my mind semi-warped. I do however, look over my shoulder for the paparazzi looking for images for the People of Walmart website. I know with my chosen eclectic attire, it is only a matter of time before I am there in all my glory. Another reason to not cross the Walmart threshold ever again. - dbA

You can find more of the unfiltered insight and the Art of Dan Abernathy at www.contributechaos.com.