Up Against the Wal-Marts: How Your Business Can Prosper in the Shadow of the Retail Giants. - Editorial - book reviews

Discount Store News, Nov 21, 1994 by Tony Lisanti

Just when you thought you had read every book about Wal-Mart, two more have been published. If you're a Wal-Mart fanatic, you might want to consider adding them to your collection. If you compete with Wal-Mart--particularly if you run a small business--you may find one of these books somewhat interesting. But if you're looking for an insightful, penetrating, and scintillating look inside the behemoth retailer's boardroom--well you're just gonna have to keep on waiting.

The two new Wal-Mart books are:

* "Up Against the Wal-Marts: How Your Business Can Prosper in the Shadow of the Retail Giants," by Don Taylor and Jeanne Smalling Archer. (Amacom Books, American Management Association, October 1994, $21.95.)

* "Wal-Mart: A History of Sam Walton's Retail Phenomenon," by Sandra S. Vance and Roy V. Scott. (Twayne Publishers, Macmillan Publishing Company, November 1994, $26.95.)

"Up Against the Wal-Marts" is a survival guide for small retailers. It outlines "strategies, tips and advice collected from hundreds of small retailers who have successfully defended their markets against the retailing giants." Perhaps this quote from Dwight Eisenhower, which starts the chapter called "Main Street is Changing," sums up the book's theme: "What counts is not necessarily the size of the dog in the fight--it's the size of the fight in the dog."

Chapter Two offers 10 survival strategies for the smaller retailer living in the shadow of a Wal-Mart. They are probably sound principles for all retailers:

* Focus completely on satisfying the customer.

* Study the success of others.

* Gather and analyze management information regularly.

* Sharpen marketing skills.

* Increase the customer's perception of value.

* Position the business uniquely.

* Eliminate waste.

* Find something to improve every day.

* Embrace change with a positive attitude.

* Pull the trigger and start the battle.

Other chapters deal with drawing customers, low-cost promotion strategies, customer service, employees, selling skills, managing information and purchasing. Chapter Eleven profiles 12 retailers that have survived competition from Wal-Mart and superstores.

Chapter Twelve analyzes the Kaizen Strategy, a Japanese concept meaning "continuous improvement involving everyone." The chapter begins with a quote from Oliver Cromwell: "He who stops being better stops being good." The book ends with a list of 273 suggestions for improving your business.

The book is an enjoyable read with a lot of practical information, great quotes and clever lists.

The second book delivers exactly what the title states--a history of Wal-Mart. It offers fewer colorful anecdotes than some previous books, and little new insight into the company. More than 50 of the book's 220 pages are devoted to a chronology and bibliography. But if it's background and history you need about Wal-Mart, this book is for you. It starts with a look at the "Beginnings and Ben Franklin," reviews the birth of discounting and goes on to trace the birth of Wal-Mart. It concludes with Wal-Mart's role as America's leading retail firm.

In one way, this book is like scouring the back issues of Discount Store News and reading all the Wal-Mart articles published over the past 32 years.

Perhaps, the best book of sorts about Wal-Mart will be the next issue of Discount Store News. Titled "Wal-Mart: The Next Generation," this special issue will look at the challenges facing the world's largest retailer through the year 2000. Unlike the new books reviewed earlier in this column, DSN's report will provide in-depth analysis, practical insight and, of course, the unique perspective of the editors of DSN, who have written more about Wal-Mart for a longer period of time than any other publication in the world.