[Vision2020] Who does Wally World threaten and what do they sell?

[Phil Nisbet]

To all

Who does Wally World threaten and what do they sell?

I have been reading this debate with some interest, because of who holds 
which side in it and what each group has to say.

First, I will note that everybody ought to have figured that Walmart was 
coming here as well as Pullman.  Two years ago they ran a major survey 
calling most households in Moscow.  Specifically the survey was asking where 
you purchased your groceries and asking if you would buy from a new store 
including a Super Store.  They asked many Wally World questions and anybody 
with a lick of sense had to realize that the survey was commissioned by 
Walmart..  A quick ask to Walmart employees any time over the last two years 
abut having to work in Pullman would have given you similar answers, they 
were not going to have to leave Moscow, but needed an expanded location.

My response to the Wally World survey was simple, I shop at Winco, why would 
I pick up my groceries at a hardware store?  Like most people, I do not shop 
multiple stores to get my groceries, I get them at one location, which ever 
has the cheapest general prices.  Employee owned and operated Winco has 
those in spades, so I go there.  For some, the specialty selection of the 
Co-Op is more important than price and I doubt that they will head to 
Walmart to get groceries either.

So the two Giant grocery chains, it’s hard to imagine being POed at one 
giant corporation because they might dump the profits of $10.5 Billion 
dollar market cap Safeway Inc and Rosauers (Owned by URM Inc of Spokane), 
are going to be harmed.  Does anybody here think that a California Tomato at 
any of the three big chains is going to be different because of the location 
where its sold?

So who in the downtown is going to be hurt by Wally World?

Wild Women Traders?  Gem State?  Book People?  Tie Dye Everything?

Local hardware for the farm and ranch community is not something that Wally 
World even sells.

Who actually gets hurt by a chain store who sells lots of cheap overseas 
produced junk?  Smaller stores who sell cheap overseas junk is who.   I 
don’t think that there are any of those types of stores in downtown.

The truth is that Wally World will be replacing existing out of area chains 
that pay their employees just as few dollars as Walmart does.  It will 
neither help nor hurt local employment, just shift it around.

Debating Wally World side tracks us from the real problem, the need to 
create living wage jobs here in Moscow.  No retail jobs are going to make 
new wealth here, not even specialty shops in Downtown.  Only adding value to 
local materials creates new wealth that allows us to see higher wages.

Why do people buy cheap plastic junk?  Because it’s what they can afford.  
Get higher wage jobs here and people will shop for higher quality goods.  
And jumping the minimum wages does not create that sort of buying power, you 
need to get jobs in that have purchasing power and $7-10 an hour jobs are 
not going to cut it.

Skilled jobs and craftsman’s jobs, organic farmers, ceramics workers, 
engineers in materials design, things that pay $15-25 an hour give you 
shoppers who buy quality and increase the revenues of downtown shops.  Start 
thinking about what we can do and make to create that instead of worrying if 
Safeway or if Wally World is going to beat each other up for the poor man’s 
paycheck.  Because if you make their customer base rich in the area, they 
will fold their tents and leave.

Phil Nisbet

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