Objectives of Walmart and Their Achievement Essay

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At the given moment, Walmart is considered to be the world’s largest chain-store retailer. This company runs large warehouse and discount department stores. It sells a great variety of goods, such as grocery, furniture, apparel, toys, and video games, pharmacy etc (Walmart, 2010, unpaged). To a great extent, this variety has been one of the keys to their success. The mission, set by this corporation is to “save people money to help them live better” (Walmart, 2010, unpaged).

In turn, the vision of this company is to be the worlds leading retailer that serves customers throughout the world. The market strategies of Walmart are focused on price differentiation, at least this is how the company positions itself. On the whole, Walmart targets customers, who are quite sensitive about the goods of products (Barbard, 2007). Some of these people cannot afford to switch to a different supplier.

The information about the company’s financial and organizational performance is available on the Internet. In particular, one should speak about annual financial reports. They indicate that the company has increased its operating income by 5.1 % in 2010 (Walmart, 2010b, p 18). However, one should take into consideration that their operating expenses which were related to restructuring of the US operations and higher health benefit costs (Walmart, 2010b, p 18).

Objective	Measure	Target	Action
1)To reduce operational expenses of the company by 3 percent at the end of 2013 fiscal year. Objective	In this case, the management should focus on such parameter as running expenses in each of the chain stores and the company in general. Measure	It is possible to single out two level of performance: 1) financial level and 2) organizational level. One should expect the reduction of administrative costs by at least 10 per cent. Target	The goal can be achieved through the reduction of administrative costs. Currently, the company hires more than 2 million employees. Some administrative positions can be eliminated since they are not essential for effective performance of the company. Action
2) To increase the company’s presence in European and Asia by 9 percent at the end of 2020. The bulk of the company’s revenues come from the US sales, namely 63.9 % (Walmart, 2010b, p 16). Hence, it is necessary to diversify their revenues. 3) To raise the profitability of Sam’s Club warehouses by 5-7 percent at the end of 2015. According to the company’s financial reports, this segment constitutes only 11,5 percent of total sales.	The progress should be assessed by the company’s market share in these particular regions. There are several measurement tools which should be used. One of them is the market share of Sam’s Club warehouses. The market share should be compared to that one of its competitors, especially Costco Wholesale.	This goal cannot be attained without changes at the level of internal operations, especially optimization of supply chain. This change will be reflected at different levels. On the one hand, it will lead to better financial performance by 5-7 percent. Secondly, it will raise customer retention rates by at least 10 percent.	1) The company should carefully analyze the situation in the markets which are of the greatest interest to Walmart. In particular, it is necessary to determine whether the level of customer loyalty is very high. 2) The second strategy is to establish supply networks. Without them the company will not be able to pursue cost differentiation policies. The management of Sam’s club should adopt more flexible pricing policies. They need to allow the customers to purchase smaller quantities of goods. At this point, they are forced to make wholesale purchases and some of them cannot afford it.

Reference List

Barbard M. (2007). “It’s Not Only About Price at Wal-Mart”. The New York Times. Web.

Walmart (2010). Corporate Website. Web.

Walmart (2010b). Walmart 2010. Financial Report. Web.

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