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The music industry doesn't like Wal-Mart's policy, muttering under its collective breath about censorship and artistic freedom, but it won't buck the system. That's because Wal-Mart's reach is enormous, representing 10% to 15% of all U.S. CD sales. "It's very difficult to have a No. 1" without Wal-Mart, says a record-company executive. That's why even the biggest, baddest acts--Nirvana, Snoop Dogg--often clean up their acts to play Wal-Mart. But even that kind of screen isn't enough for parents such as Clarke, who hold Wal-Mart accountable for everything that ends up on the shelves: "They tout a policy that their stores are a safe haven, but they didn't honor it."
Wal-Mart has a clearly articulated view of its role in society and the economy--to be an "agent" for the consumer. The company views its job as finding out exactly what folks want and getting those products into the stores at the lowest possible cost. It's a strategy that has worked superbly. Wal-Mart earned $4.4 billion last year on sales of $139 billion. It serves 90 million to 100 million customers each week. So while Wal-Mart is a conservative company born of the rural South, it hasn't let that get in the way of some basic considerations of commerce. Years ago, church leaders were unhappy, and unavailing, when the company began to open its stores on Sundays. The customers, not any other authority, would be obeyed.
This kind of practical morality operates on a larger scale too. Take the sale of alcoholic beverages. Wal-Mart does not sell beer and wine in its traditional discount stores. Yet if you walk into many Wal-Mart supercenters, stores as big as 220,000 sq. ft. that combine a supermarket with a traditional Wal-Mart, you'll find plenty of Budweiser to put in the coolers being sold in sporting goods. Wine and beer are also sold in Sam's Clubs and in the company's new chain of downsized Neighborhood Markets, a.k.a. "small marts."
Why the distinction? Wal-Mart executives attribute the decision to the customers, who say they expect to be able to buy beer and wine in supercenters just as they do at competitors' stores of a similar type. Yet booze will remain verboten in fuddy-duddy old Wal-Mart discount stores. Explains Glass: "What's the difference between selling in a supercenter and a Wal-Mart? I can't tell you I can give you a definite answer. But I can tell you that I have a rationale for it." Nevertheless, within the company and without, there was muttering that Sam--Wal-Mart's late founder, Sam Walton--wouldn't stand for such a thing. Wrong, says Glass. Sam knew better than to buck the customers.
Hence, Wal-Mart is well stocked in inconsistencies. South Park, the cartoon television series and recent movie, features a funny but foulmouthed cast of characters and an infinite collection of toilet jokes. The South Park video game got to the shelves but not the film. Reason: Wal-Mart's game buyer figured that customers who purchase it are already familiar with the characters. The video buyer, on the other hand, believed that customers associate animated films with movies such as Bambi and not with Cartman and his profane pals. (No doubt the boys would have joyously killed and consumed Bambi.)