Opened my daily businessman email today (because, you know, I need this sort of thing) and wasn't prepared for the depression it would cause. Wal-Mart, in a stroke of genius, has decided to scale back on their DVD section.
So let's discuss Wal-Mart for a second. On second thought, I'll just type and you can respond if you feel the need. Tired of being associated with the lower-class, Wal-Mart is working on upscaling their stores in an effort to attract new customers (who, coincidentally, will have more money to spend) and pick up some sales in a slow time. It sounds like a great plan on paper. Who hasn't walked into a Wal-Mart and been depressed by the filth and just... crap piled all over the place?
The change has been really evident in the Wal-Mart nearest to me. The household goods are no longer in long, dark aisles. Now they have a little open area with display models. It really is classier than it used to be. And it's been a year, at least, since I've seen the shelves filled with random clearance "merchandise" sitting by the checkout lines, in hope somone needs a sixpack of light bulbs with three pre-broken.
But at what price do I finally get to shop in a clean store? For starters, I've pretty much given up on buying food there. An aisle full of potato chips, but there are only four different kinds. How many facings of Tostitos does any one store need? And it doesn't make sense to me to cut back on the amount of dairy offerings, when the space has to remain the same. Instead of choices, now it's one door full of A thing.
So they still offer low prices, but your choices are limited to what one brand they carry or going somewhere else. Personally, I'd rather go someplace else. I'm not huge into traveling all over town when I can get all my groceries at King Soopers.
And now fewer DVDs. I won't miss those huge cardboard displays containing a total of 20 DVDs, I assume this means the end to Wal-Mart exclusive discs. Typically, they weren't that great anyway, but it was nice to think they MIGHT have something different to offer. And I have to assume this effort to class the place up will be the death of my beloved $5 bins. So really, a place I used to visit three or four times a week, I'll never have to visit again. Looks like it's Target from now on.
The 'other' Davenport Wal-Mart that's across town actually moved their $5 DVDs into their endcaps, and put all copies of each movie together, thus eliminating the bins but retaining the cheap movies. Definitely more pleasing to the eye and better than wading through those bins. I have also disowned WM, for groceries at least, so haven't noticed whether our's is improved our not. Certainly isn't a bad idea.
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