WALMART CASE STUDY-

PRODUCT LIFE CYCLE

NAME-SHUBHAM KUMAR
OTP-206
 Q.Is Walmart good for society ? Would society be
better of with or without walmart?
Society is better with walmart because:
• Walmart has committed to social sustainability goals under which
-walmart has set standards and goals for its suppliers. Its
workforce is equitably compensated and minorities and women
have opportunities to progress to management positions.
- the company contributes towards workforce development
programs , community efforts to reduce poverty and charity
functions.
• Walmart works towards decreasing enviromental impact by
-lowering production of waste, reduction in emission of
greenhouse gas.
-minimising waste due to overstocking of perishables,etc.
 Q. Walmart says that it creates new markets for small-and medium- size businesses and that it supports
growth and innovation for these businesses. For some of these suppliers, Walmart is their primary
customer and thus the business owners have little choice about adopting Walmart’s standards. Do you
think this is fair? Do you think Walmart’s powerful positions helps these business owners or hinders them?

Walmart operates more than 8400 retail units around the world with more than
100000 suppliers and hence being such a big company exercise massive pressure
on its suppliers.
• Some suppliers have to face huge barriers setting their own standard, because of
the fixed guidelines by their primary customer.
• In order to attract customers and give them great prices walmart often tends to
cut down on the basic factors like employee working condition or enviromental
impact ,they also tend to ensure buying cost from the supplier are the least.
• On the other hand has developed guidelines and toolkit to help suppliers reduce
waste and perform optimum utilisation of resources. This helps keeping down
prices in business by making it more efficient.
• Walmart gives additional training and support to suppliers whose performance
fall below sustainability standard.
• It also launched fair trade bananas which support sustainable community.
• Despite all these efforts many small to medium business are heavily hinderd by
walmart.
 Q. Walmart’s sustainability program addresses each of the criticisms levelled against it. If a
companies forced to launch an initiative to prevent falling sales or public relations problems, do you
think the company is fully committed to those efforts? How could you tell if the company was
making progress toward its stated goal?

• It is questionable that Walmart launched its Sustainability 360 initiative

after the argument of public relations debacles that involved human
rights, environmental sustainability, and social responsibility. I think the
company could be fully committed to its sustainability program and has a
responsibility to its shareholders and investors.
• Furthermore, Walmart started its sustainability program with the
belief that a commitment to sustainability can save the company money
by reducing waste, increasing productivity etc.
• There are also some goals which we can easily tell if they have been met
or not. For example, it aims to bring more display cases in US stores with
energy-saving LED lighting, and stock more energy-saving compact
fluorescent light bulbs. Progress on such goals can be charted
through observation every year.
 Q. Walmart’s Sustainable Product Index is intended to provide
consumers with a ranking of a product’s sustainability across its life cycle.
Would this ranking influence your buying decisions? Why or why not?

1. Ranking of product sustainability across its

life cycle will definitely be a plus point for me
but there are the other basic factors like price
quality etc also to be considered. So yes it
will.
2. I would be more considerate about quality of
the product given at that particular price.