A skeptical BW Online correspondent finds he can't resist the relaunched site's ease of use, prices, and selection -- though the book section could use some help
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Let me say this up front: I hate Wal-Mart. I hate the blue smocks. I hate the fake smiles from underpaid store clerks. I abhor the union-busting tactics of this highly profitable company. And I definitely loathe the cold, impersonal feel of its monstrous stores, particularly where they've driven more expensive but much more homey mom-and-pop shops out of business. I'll set foot in a Wal-Mart only under strong duress.
My boss, on the other hand, loves the place. At least, he loves to shop there. He comes from Oklahoma, you see, and thinks clothing shipped from Wal-Mart headquarters in Arkansas, one state over, is both economical and somehow more exotic. Why buy expensive, designer jeans when you can buy Wal-Mart jeans? They last just as long, he has told me several times.
"A MAJOR FORCE." Someday, my Okie boss told me, Wal-Mart will come to dominate Web retailing. He says its vaunted logistics system will prove a perfect back-end-fulfillment center to make sure customers get what they pay for in a timely manner. He points out that Wal-Mart's negotiating might with suppliers already grabs rock-bottom prices. And when those prices come home to roost, Wal-Mart will rule online. "No one likes to go there," he said. "But when you can order from your house and not have to deal with the place, they will become a major force."
His claims once seemed preposterous to me. Wal-Mart was the favorite whipping boy of dot-com e-tailers who claimed the lumbering giant couldn't move fast enough. But now the e-tailers who flogged Wal-Mart so hard are mostly bankrupt. And as much as I hate to say this (gulp), my boss may be right. After visiting Wal-Mart's recently relaunched e-commerce site, I'm a convert to Walmart.com. Not Wal-Mart, mind you. Walmart.com. All-cotton wrinkle-resistant slacks perfect for office slacking at 15 bucks a pop? That's a steal. And they'll arrive in my mailbox sans blue-smock trauma.
Here's my tale of conversion. Upon hearing the news of Walmart.com's rebirth as a Web site, I snidely volunteered to check it out for a review. I thought it would be an easy slam. A past visit to Walmart.com in search of a steak-knife kit Consumer Reports had given a big thumbs-up turned into a confusing 45 minutes wandering through ugly pages that ended with a call to the site's 800 number.
LOGICALLY ORGANIZED. Not with the new design. I found a clean, easy-to-navigate, miniature online version of the company's standard store. The categories, all displayed on the white-background front page in small but clearly readable print, were logically organized with click-through submenus rather than the cumbersome pull-down type. I clicked on the areas I'd be most likely to shop: apparel and books.
Walmart.com had clothing broken down into men's and women's, and along simple subcategories under each gender. I clicked on pants, a staple I'm short on now. A half-dozen possibilities popped up, each paired with a crisp photo image. And one of them was exactly what I'd been looking for: all-cotton wrinkle-resistant khakis from a recognizable, albeit not top-tier, brand name.
The price undercut even New York's cheapest discount stores. In fact, I'd seen these same khakis on sale in better department stores for $40 a pair. Fifteen dollars at Walmart.com? Can't argue with that.
FITTING MY SHAPE. I encountered my first pull-down menu searching for my size. I have, shall we say, a distinctive shape requiring a 36-inch waist and a 29-inch inseam, a relatively rare combo that many stores don't stock. But Wal-Mart had it at its Web store, along with the longest list of possible waist-inseam combinations I'd ever seen anywhere online. To be sure, they didn't have the variety of styles I could have found in the store itself. But not a bad show at all.
I clicked back to the men's apparel directory page. This time I homed in on T-shirts, another staple I can never get enough of. Wal-Mart didn't offer a wide selection of makers. But it did have exactly what I wanted: Hanes all-cotton tees with no front pocket (my fashion-minded fiancee feels the pocket mars the fine line of my sweaters and ironed shirts). In fact, many bricks-and-mortar retailers don't seem to stock no-pocket Ts from Hanes, so I gave Walmart.com another positive check mark and threw a few shirts in my online shopping basket.
Then it was on to the books section, which was a bit disappointing, particularly for an Amazon.com patron such as myself. The blue-smock store's tendency toward the lowest common denominator made for a paltry selection of megabest-sellers, such as the Harry Potter series.
ROOM TO COMPETE. Walmart.com can't match Amazon's recommendation feature. On Jeff Bezos' site, this well-honed feature often spits out excellent suggestions based on my past buying habits and those of others who read the same books I do. But Walmart.com should make inroads with book lovers by beating Amazon's shipping rates. Many of us are fed up with the way Amazon jacks up shipping costs for bigger purchases.
Walmart.com still has plenty to prove. No one has mounted a successful Web retail discount store. And unlike competitor Sears, Walmart.com doesn't have a fleet of vans and smaller vehicles to deliver heavier products to the customer's doorstep, let alone help with installation of appliances. But if the site can convert hard-nosed Wal-Mart haters like me, I'd imagine the blue-smock boys have a much bigger game plan. I can't wait to see the rest of it. Boss, you were right. Walmart.com is a fine place to shop.
Salkever is Business Week Online's technology editor Edited by Douglas Harbrecht
Copyright 2000, by The McGraw-Hill Companies Inc. All rights reserved.
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