5Rt942 Biography Of Sam Walton Assessment Answers

1. A brief summary of the book. This section should not be more than one page typed.

2. What do you think the entrepreneur did wrong?

3. What did the entrepreneur do right?

4. How would you have done things if you were in their position? (No matter how much

they achieved, I am sure there is something you would have done differently.)

5. What economic principles (things you learned in this course) were used in this business?

6. What did you get out of this book?

2. Like all other entrepreneurs Sam Walton also used to face failures. He was a successful retailer in 1950. As Sam was quite young and unexperienced when he opened the variety store, he had faced loss (Walton, Sam and Huey 1993). Therefore, after a legal mistake in the contract he had to close down his store. Sam realizes that he used to pay a high rent for the variety store after a very long time. Sam also worked in a retail store after graduating from the college. After that Sam bought a Benjamin Franklin store, however due to lack of legal know how he had to close down his store.

3. The Newport experience of Sam of legal mishap I turned out to be a blessing for him. The success took off when Sam started opening discount stores. He used of keep his price as low as possible and therefore this resulted in increase of sales quite fast. He also applied the same concept while opening Wal-Mart. Sam also did a quite a lot of research and then started opening discount stores ( LeCavalier and Jesse 2016). He knew that the discounting concept would dominate the market. He also started his business in a small market. Also, he made his wife and children partners in the business in order to keep the business in the family. Sam also maintained a strong relationship with the customers. In order to provide best service to his customers he would ask his employees to act like customers.

4. Sam Walton had great business ideas. He built Wal-Mart into a million dollar empire with all his hard work. His autobiography is like a bible for all small businessman. However, had I been in their position I would have also followed their steps in order to succeed. I would also provide incentives to the employers so that they get motivation to work more I would also have invested money for advertising as advertising also plays a major role to earn profits in business.

5. There were some economic principles which are used in the business. One of the economic principle that was used is that rational people think at the margin that is customers usually tend to purchase those goods from which they will get the maximum level of satisfaction in terms of price(Copeland, Nick, and  Labusk 2013). His the reason why Sam Walton used to give huge discounts and kept his profit margins low initially. People always response to incentives which is another economic principle, for this reason the number of sales for Wal-Mart was high as Walton used to sell his goods at a much low price.

6. There are lot of things which can be learnt from the book Made in America by Sam Walton. It acts as a bible for the small businessman. He offers plenty of advices to the new and small business man (Ellickson, Paul and Grieco 2013.). One of the lessons that we can learn is that though Sam was the richest man at that time he used to lead a very humble life. Despite his fame and money he focused on helping others. The second lesson is that we should not dwell on disappointments. He always used to experiment with his ideas. Although in the initial years his variety stores did not run, Sam did not give up in opening new stores and starting new businesses. Another lesson which can be learned is that customers should always be given the priority and therefore he always used to ask his employees to act like the customers.

Reference List

Copeland, Nick, and Christine Labuski. The world of Wal-Mart: discounting the american dream. Routledge, 2013.

Ellickson, Paul B., and Paul LE Grieco. "Wal-Mart and the geography of grocery retailing." Journal of Urban Economics 75 (2013): 1-14.

Ghazzawi, Issam A., Marie Palladini, and Teresa Martinelli-Lee. "The Wal-Mart stores, Inc.: An American dream that touched the world." Journal of the International Academy for Case Studies 20, no. 1 (2014): 9-32.

LeCavalier, Jesse. The Rule of Logistics: Walmart and the Architecture of Fulfillment. University of Minnesota Press, 2016.

Shabbir, M. S. "Why manufacturers are less powerful than retailers in trade circles? A case study of Wal-Mart retailing business." Journal of Global Economics (2016).

Walton, Sam, and John Huey. Sam Walton, made in America: my story. Bantam, 1993.