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FWIW, one could argue that Walmart didn’t pay $3B for Jet; they paid $3B for Marc Lore, which might still prove to have been a decent buy.

snarf21 6y ago
Exactly this. Additionally, he HATES Amazon after what happened with his previous start-up diapers.com. Jet was another at bat against Amazon. Wal-Mart wanted his expertise and his drive to make them a true competitor to Amazon in the online space. It seems like it is working. The biggest problem is probably that the rest of Wal-Mart is not super agile and changes aren't going as fast as desired.
- lotsofpulp 6y ago
  Walmart could have a huge competitive advantage if they advertised that they don’t commingle stock and made it easy to only order shipped and sold by Walmart.com. Although, Walmart also is known for accepting lower quality goods from brands in order to sell them at lower price, which isn’t much different from counterfeits, so I still wouldn’t buy from them.
  - herman_toothrot 6y ago
    Do you have an example of an item being sold at Walmart which is a cheaper version packaged as the more expensive version? Genuinely curious, I'm unaware of this...
    - objclxt 6y ago
      This is relatively common for big box stores, not just Walmart. Manufacturers might produce retailer specific SKUs to sell at different price points, cutting features or perhaps using lower quality parts. For example, you might get a TV that shares the same model name, but has multiple SKUs, one of which has fewer HDMI ports or uses panels with a higher dead pixel tolerance.
    - snarf21 6y ago
      I can give you a specific example. Hanes T-shirts, for use as under shirts. They version you get at Walmart is thinner fabric, the seams are single stitched, not double. My understanding is that Walmart usually sets the price for these kinds of things and it is up to the vendor to make a version they can sell at that price and make money.
      - H1Supreme 6y ago
        I actually like the thinner fabric undershirts. My issue with the one's I've bought from walmart is there's basically no consistency. I bought the v-neck versions to wear under a button up shirt, and had to turn half of them into rags because necks were so wide/deep.
      - Klinky 6y ago
        I buy direct from Hanes.com and the quality control is iffy even when buying direct.
    - wccrawford 6y ago
      https://www.quora.com/Do-companies-make-their-products-of-cheaper-quality-when-selling-to-Walmart https://www.quora.com/Do-companies-make-their-products-of-ch... There are a couple examples here of products that appear to be the same, but aren't quite the same. I also remember reading about a lawnmower manufacturer that was forced to use plastic parts (the deck, IIRC) instead of metal to reduce cost to sell at Walmart. I couldn't find that article now, though. I read it years ago.
    - xnyan 6y ago
      Stanley tools, Mount Olive pickles, Honeywell air filters, lots of clothing and many more. edit: gas powered tools (just tools in general) particularly lawn mowers are made to cheaper specs for walmart.
    - robotnixon 6y ago
      "Snapper is the sort of high-quality nameplate, like Levi Strauss, that Wal-Mart hopes can ultimately make it more Target-like. He suggested that Snapper find a lower-cost contract manufacturer. He suggested producing a separate, lesser-quality line with the Snapper nameplate just for Wal-Mart. Just like Levi did." https://www.fastcompany.com/54763/man-who-said-no-wal-mart https://www.fastcompany.com/54763/man-who-said-no-wal-mart
      - cptskippy 6y ago
        The book "The United States of Walmart" goes into how Walmart pressures manufacturers to lower price points, margins, outsource, etc to meet the price Walmart wants to sell their products at. They have done significant damage to once reputable brands like Levis and Huffy in the interest of having that premium brand in their stores. For much of the 90s and early 2000s offshoring of manufacturing in the US was primarily driven my Walmart demanding lower per unit prices. Manufacturers had little choice but to comply since not being in Walmart meant losing out on a majority of the market.
        josefresco 6y ago
        Maybe this is a result of what you describe but I never remember Levis or Huffy being premium brands. Before Walmart "came to our town" those brands were featured in other big-box stores.
        cptskippy 6y ago
        Maybe premium is the wrong word. Levis and Huffy were never designer brands, they were the standard in quality. Like Tide Detergent, Heinz Ketchup or Coca Cola, they were brand to beat. The pattern seems to happen many brands over time that sell out or fail. You see it across markets with brands like Packard Bell, Kodak, Polaroid, Martha Stewart, Kate Spade, RCA, etc. 50 years ago if you had a Zenith or RCA TV it was a sign of quality, 10 years ago you'd be mocked. Before the turn of the century Philips was known for consumer electronics and even made videogame consoles, now they make lightbulbs.
    - cptskippy 6y ago
      A lot of retailers and manufacturers do this. It's not so much that the products are inferior, just different. A lot of times it's tricking you into thinking you're getting something you're not, occasionally it's to offer a better exclusive version. Sometimes it's a TV with a lower spec panel or limited I/O, other times it'll be something like a Laptop with a smaller harddrive and less ram to drive the price point down. It can go the other direction too, where the spec is bumped. Roku makes versions of their Streaming Box that are only available at Walmart. They're not inferior, they're just configurations you can't get elsewhere. The Express+ is a Walmart only version of their crappiest STB with their premium remote, because the basic remote sucks. This happens a lot at places that do price matching because it's then impossible to say you found a product elsewhere because it literally is only sold in their store.
  - LargeWu 6y ago
    This is the primary reason I don't shop at Walmart. Almost everything you find in their stores, save for grocery and branded household supplies, is of inferior quality.
axaxs 6y ago
Not saying you're wrong, but Walmart acquired Jet 4 years ago. If their current web offering is the end result, I'd say they overpaid by about... 3 billion dollars.
- projectileboy 6y ago
  Haha... I don’t totally disagree, but you might be missing the bigger picture. For example, under Marc Lore’s watch, Walmart Grocery rolled out in a very big way, which was a huge win.

snarf21 6y ago

Exactly this. Additionally, he HATES Amazon after what happened with his previous start-up diapers.com. Jet was another at bat against Amazon. Wal-Mart wanted his expertise and his drive to make them a true competitor to Amazon in the online space. It seems like it is working. The biggest problem is probably that the rest of Wal-Mart is not super agile and changes aren't going as fast as desired.

lotsofpulp 6y ago
Walmart could have a huge competitive advantage if they advertised that they don’t commingle stock and made it easy to only order shipped and sold by Walmart.com. Although, Walmart also is known for accepting lower quality goods from brands in order to sell them at lower price, which isn’t much different from counterfeits, so I still wouldn’t buy from them.
- herman_toothrot 6y ago
  Do you have an example of an item being sold at Walmart which is a cheaper version packaged as the more expensive version? Genuinely curious, I'm unaware of this...
  - objclxt 6y ago
    This is relatively common for big box stores, not just Walmart. Manufacturers might produce retailer specific SKUs to sell at different price points, cutting features or perhaps using lower quality parts. For example, you might get a TV that shares the same model name, but has multiple SKUs, one of which has fewer HDMI ports or uses panels with a higher dead pixel tolerance.
  - snarf21 6y ago
    I can give you a specific example. Hanes T-shirts, for use as under shirts. They version you get at Walmart is thinner fabric, the seams are single stitched, not double. My understanding is that Walmart usually sets the price for these kinds of things and it is up to the vendor to make a version they can sell at that price and make money.
    - H1Supreme 6y ago
      I actually like the thinner fabric undershirts. My issue with the one's I've bought from walmart is there's basically no consistency. I bought the v-neck versions to wear under a button up shirt, and had to turn half of them into rags because necks were so wide/deep.
    - Klinky 6y ago
      I buy direct from Hanes.com and the quality control is iffy even when buying direct.
  - wccrawford 6y ago
    https://www.quora.com/Do-companies-make-their-products-of-cheaper-quality-when-selling-to-Walmart https://www.quora.com/Do-companies-make-their-products-of-ch... There are a couple examples here of products that appear to be the same, but aren't quite the same. I also remember reading about a lawnmower manufacturer that was forced to use plastic parts (the deck, IIRC) instead of metal to reduce cost to sell at Walmart. I couldn't find that article now, though. I read it years ago.
  - xnyan 6y ago
    Stanley tools, Mount Olive pickles, Honeywell air filters, lots of clothing and many more. edit: gas powered tools (just tools in general) particularly lawn mowers are made to cheaper specs for walmart.
  - robotnixon 6y ago
    "Snapper is the sort of high-quality nameplate, like Levi Strauss, that Wal-Mart hopes can ultimately make it more Target-like. He suggested that Snapper find a lower-cost contract manufacturer. He suggested producing a separate, lesser-quality line with the Snapper nameplate just for Wal-Mart. Just like Levi did." https://www.fastcompany.com/54763/man-who-said-no-wal-mart https://www.fastcompany.com/54763/man-who-said-no-wal-mart
    - cptskippy 6y ago
      The book "The United States of Walmart" goes into how Walmart pressures manufacturers to lower price points, margins, outsource, etc to meet the price Walmart wants to sell their products at. They have done significant damage to once reputable brands like Levis and Huffy in the interest of having that premium brand in their stores. For much of the 90s and early 2000s offshoring of manufacturing in the US was primarily driven my Walmart demanding lower per unit prices. Manufacturers had little choice but to comply since not being in Walmart meant losing out on a majority of the market.
      - josefresco 6y ago
        Maybe this is a result of what you describe but I never remember Levis or Huffy being premium brands. Before Walmart "came to our town" those brands were featured in other big-box stores.
        cptskippy 6y ago
        Maybe premium is the wrong word. Levis and Huffy were never designer brands, they were the standard in quality. Like Tide Detergent, Heinz Ketchup or Coca Cola, they were brand to beat. The pattern seems to happen many brands over time that sell out or fail. You see it across markets with brands like Packard Bell, Kodak, Polaroid, Martha Stewart, Kate Spade, RCA, etc. 50 years ago if you had a Zenith or RCA TV it was a sign of quality, 10 years ago you'd be mocked. Before the turn of the century Philips was known for consumer electronics and even made videogame consoles, now they make lightbulbs.
  - cptskippy 6y ago
    A lot of retailers and manufacturers do this. It's not so much that the products are inferior, just different. A lot of times it's tricking you into thinking you're getting something you're not, occasionally it's to offer a better exclusive version. Sometimes it's a TV with a lower spec panel or limited I/O, other times it'll be something like a Laptop with a smaller harddrive and less ram to drive the price point down. It can go the other direction too, where the spec is bumped. Roku makes versions of their Streaming Box that are only available at Walmart. They're not inferior, they're just configurations you can't get elsewhere. The Express+ is a Walmart only version of their crappiest STB with their premium remote, because the basic remote sucks. This happens a lot at places that do price matching because it's then impossible to say you found a product elsewhere because it literally is only sold in their store.
- LargeWu 6y ago
  This is the primary reason I don't shop at Walmart. Almost everything you find in their stores, save for grocery and branded household supplies, is of inferior quality.

axaxs 6y ago

Not saying you're wrong, but Walmart acquired Jet 4 years ago. If their current web offering is the end result, I'd say they overpaid by about... 3 billion dollars.

projectileboy 6y ago
Haha... I don’t totally disagree, but you might be missing the bigger picture. For example, under Marc Lore’s watch, Walmart Grocery rolled out in a very big way, which was a huge win.