CHUCK BARTELS/The Associated Press | Posted: Thursday, June 1, 2006 7:00 pm
FAYETTEVILLE, Ark. — Wal-Mart Stores Inc. used its annual meeting Friday to promote its plans for changes to its stores, trumpet its expansion in the U.S. and abroad and emphasize that the world’s largest retailer is changing to sustain its rapid growth rate.
The company’s critics urged Wal-Mart to offer higher pay, better health insurance and make other changes for its 1.3 million U.S. workers.
Wal-Mart chief executive officer Lee Scott didn’t directly address the union-financed groups.
Scott and other executives drew enthusiasm from the 15,000 shareholders and workers packed into Bud Walton Arena on the University of Arkansas campus.
Scott said Hurricane Katrina inspired a new vision at Wal-Mart. The company’s rapid effort to provide relief supplies drew praise from Wal-Mart’s critics.
Scott asked rhetorically, “How can we use our unique strength to be that company all the time?”
Wal-Mart has several experimental stores, where it is testing new designs and aisles that have merchandise targeted to local demographics, including an “urban and multicultural” store in the Chicago area.
The company is streamlining its inventory to speed items to shelves and trim the time between manufacture and arrival of items in the stores. And many of those items will increasingly be geared to upscale shoppers, executives said.
Chief financial officer Tom Schoewe said the company can still build sales growth in existing stores while gaining market share in the U.S. and internationally.
Schoewe also praised workers for helping earnings grow faster than sales in the last fiscal year, when revenues were up 9.4 percent and earnings were up 11.2 percent.
“The trends here are awesome,” Schoewe said. “This is a growth company.”
The company is adding about 600 stores this year, about a third of which will be international, including Canada’s first three Supercenters. Wal-Mart has more than 6,500 stores in 15 countries and serves 176 million customers per week.
Schoewe said the company intends to keep expanding its retail footprint by 8 percent annually.
Board chairman Rob Walton, a son of Wal-Mart founder Sam Walton, said his late father would be surprised at the scope Wal-Mart has taken on, but would be right at home.
“Nobody loved change more than Sam Walton,” Rob Walton said. “As long as we continue to change, there are no limits to what we can achieve.”
Scott said the company shows every day that it is a good place to work. He cited thousands of people applying for a few hundred jobs at new Wal-Marts, a health plan that is open to full and part-time workers who, after a year in the plan, will have no cap on how much the plan will pay in lifetime benefits.
“We have made great progress in health care,” Scott said.
Critics of Wal-Mart, including the union-backed groups Wal-Mart Watch and WakeUpWalMart.com have taken credit for recent improvements in the health plan.
Popular singer Beyonce performed at the end of the meeting. American Idol finalist Taylor Hicks sang a pair of songs.
Wal-Mart to quantify minority, women jobs All shareholder proposals put forth at Wal-Mart’s annual meeting were rejected.
One, which asked Wal-Mart to issue an equal opportunity report, was removed from the agenda after the company agreed to quantify its women and minority workers and to define their duties.
Failed proposals included requests for humane slaughter of chickens, reports on Wal-Mart’s political contributions and requiring majority votes instead of a plurality for new directors.