The Clever Construction of the World's Largest Retailer
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This video explores the design and impact of Walmart, the largest retailer on earth. With stores covering more land than Manhattan, Walmart's vast network includes various formats like Sam's Clubs, Supercenters, Walmarts, Discount Centers, and Neighborhood Markets. The company controls a significant share of the built environment, optimized for the distribution of goods and capital generation. Despite their ubiquitous presence, most people are unaware of what goes into Walmart stores or why they are the way they are. The video delves into the history of Walmart's self-service retail model, its distribution centers, and the importance of data flow. It also examines the design elements of Walmart stores, the adaptable exteriors, and the flexible interior spaces.
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Architecture with Stewart is a CZcams journey exploring architecture’s deep and enduring stories in all their bewildering glory. Weekly videos and occasional live events breakdown a wide range of topics related to the built environment in order to increase their general understanding and advocate their importance in shaping the world we inhabit.
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Stewart Hicks is an architectural design educator that leads studios and lecture courses as an Associate Professor in the School of Architecture at the University of Illinois at Chicago. He also serves as an Associate Dean in the College of Architecture, Design, and the Arts and is the co-founder of the practice Design With Company. His work has earned awards such as the Architecture Record Design Vanguard Award or the Young Architect’s Forum Award and has been featured in exhibitions such as the Chicago Architecture Biennial and Design Miami, as well as at the V&A Museum and Tate Modern in London. His writings can be found in the co-authored book Misguided Tactics for Propriety Calibration, published with the Graham Foundation, as well as essays in MONU magazine, the AIA Journal Manifest, Log, bracket, and the guest-edited issue of MAS Context on the topic of character architecture.
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I worked at a Walmart superstore a few years ago, and if you think those are massive, the back area is almost as big. Rows after rows of items to stock, grocery pickup work areas, offices, storerooms. It's huge.
Another trick I see is Walmart charging prices ending in 93, 94 or 97, and other numbers. People pick up something for $4.93 at Walmart that's $4.99 somewhere else and think they're getting a deal.
Every retailer has pricing codes as well stating clearance, sale duration, amount of times its been on sale and what level sale it is on, whether its local, regional, or national sale, etc etc.
The numbers chosen are for the reason you stated, but .93 is not the same as .97 for clarification reasons.
@@wolfgineer9340 That is a level of detail I will probably stay up nights pondering.
So your saying the shelves are empty due to terrible employees?
@@justingrabowski4861 No, the shelves are empty because no matter how fast they try to stock it, I've heard that Walmart is a tad popular these days. If an item has 10 units on the shelf, no one is going to stop someone from taking all 10.
@@justingrabowski4861 mix of “terrible” employees and good hard working people not feeling like they are being compensated well enough for the work load. Most stores pay only a few dollars over minimum wage, stockers being paid even less. I made $11 an hour when I worked there, and that was hazard pay due to Covid. It was usually $10 an hour. Would you forget your other duties and sacrifice stressing yourself out day in and day out to restock a shelf immediately for $10 before taxes? If you would, you’re a fool. There are strict systems in place as to how and when items are restocked. The back of house workers have plenty of other tasks such as truck unloading, crate unloading, back of department organization, restocking returns/ items put back at the register. Just because you don’t see it doesn’t mean it doesn’t happen. That was the point of this video as far as I’m concerned. But yes, there are also just very lazy people who don’t care.
I remember when Walmart didn't sell tobacco products, alcohol or fireworks and paid time and a half on Sundays.
Walmart has become the most selfish and greedy company on earth to work for. They pay as little as possible and always expect more and more work to be completed in the same 8 hours for no additional pay. No holiday pay no overtime pay, not much pay at all for everything the company expects. You can't do enough and the work a person does is never good enough ! ALWAYS FINDING FAULT WITH EVERTHING !
I remember Walmart selling alcohol and tobacco even back in the 90s. When I worked there shortly in ~2006, we still got Sunday Premium pay. While I was there, it was an extra $1 per hour iirc. I avoid Walmart nowadays, there really isn't a reason to go there (at least for me), unless you live in a rural area without many other options.
I remember when they sold guns
@@Zzz2xthey still do sell guns in my area in ohio
@@Zzz2xthey don’t sell ammunition for handgun/ pistol anymore. But still sell ammunition for shotgun and rifles.
Cool story bro time - It was probably 1989 and I lived in an apt with my dad. The stoners across the hall (married couple) kept asking me if I had ever heard of Sam Walton or Walmart. At the time, there were none in our area (central PA) so I had not. He kept telling me how he and his wife were buying as much stock as they could afford with whatever was left after bills. He encouraged me to participate. I declined. i wonder where they are today?
Probably the same place I am today. Back in 1997 just before Steve Jobs returned to Apple, I purchased around $38,000 of Apple stock. It was either that or a new BMW, chose the Apple stock as the 1994 BMW that I had was working just fine. Both cars I suspect are long, long in the junk yard. The Apple stock, well just let me say it is doing just fine. 🤑🤑🤑🤑🤑🤑
@@kennixox262 Just purchased a Model Y with my apple stock lmao. Good ride brother.
@@SoulSairhow old was your stock?
I bought tons of Apple stock too, around $38 and it rose over a time to $54 and looked to be dropping soon, so I thought time to leave. You can all thank ME, every time I leave a stock it doubles, or with Apple quadruples. YW
@@kennixox262 so with apple stock in 1997/1998 being at an increase of about 95,377% you should be sitting on around oh 20 mil?
Back in the early 1990's I had a cleaning supply business.
My customers kept saying that they could get the same thing at Sam' s club cheaper.
So, I took a little side trip to Sam's club to check it out. I compared prices for comparable products and sizes.
What I found was yes, 1/3 of the products were cheaper at Sam's. But what I also found out was 1/3 of the products were equally priced AND 1/3 of the products were actually more expensive at Sam's Club!
The point is that Wal-Mart carefully prices it's products to appear cheap. You buy some commonly used products and they are but everything else isn't.
If you believe that's unfavorable, consider calculating the ratio of Dollar Tree items per serving or ounce in comparison to Walmart. Surprisingly, Dollar Tree exhibits a significantly higher markup. Their strategy revolves around offering slightly smaller package sizes.
@Rockford Files
Yeah, I considered that also. I compared similarly sized bottles or per ounce or best guess if either of those two strategies were not viable.
I tried to keep it as scientific as possible in order to come to a conclusion that answered the question properly.
In the 1950s there were lots of small competitors doing similar marketing moves and using retail physical changes to improve. Walmart gets way more credit than it deserves. Walmart does use end caps and islands to a huge advantage. Their merchandising selection of products at the checkout area needs much improvement.
Yep. And no one has mentioned how Walmart really started to blossom after the Clinton’s got elected and they signed that free trade deal with China. Allowing Walmart to flood america with cheap toxic items from China. They literally bribed the Clinton’s to allow them to bring China into America. Tyson chicken was the same way. The Clinton’s made Tyson chicken the national chicken supplier for American schools. Both companies came out of Arkansas at the same time.
A while back I read a history of Mamouth Mart, which used to have a store near my house back in the 1960s. Apparently, somewhere around 1960, Sam Walton did a tour of one of their stores and complemented them on their innovations. Perhaps he should have thanked them as well; he was a quick study.
Before this video "All I know about walmarts is that they're a cheap box with stuff in it"
After this video "Walmarts are a cheap box with stuff in it"
Walmart is boxes within boxes within boxes…
It is America’s equivalent of the famous Russian Matryoshka dolls.
Too funny, so right. When I read the thumbnail I thought, “it’s a box full of Chinese merchandise, what architecture?”
It's a cheap box with overpriced stuff that's falsely advertised as "always low prices."
There were more details in this video than just that.
You gotta slow cause everything comes from China aka Asia even the most expensive brands of the world use china so stop the cap Smgdh 😂😂😂
I found the “Self Service” vs. “Full Service” explanation very interesting, thanks.
A quick comment on the notion that Walmart was only the third retailer to introduce the self service model. This isn’t the case. Piggly Wiggly is the innovator in this respect, introducing its first self service store way back in 1916. It then franchised and grew to hundreds of locations in the 1920s. By the 1950s, this supermarket approach was prevalent. Most independent stores had already copied Piggly Wiggly by the 1930s, decades before Walmart came in.
Yes, that's true. Sam Walton claims it was the third. Piggly Wiggly pioneered it for sure and I just wanted to draw attention to how Walmart took advantage of it fully.
@@stewarthicks love your channel and thanks for the reply
I live 40 miles from the nearest Walmart, and still shop there at least once a month. When somebody lives 40 miles from the nearest Walmart, you can bet the closest store is a dollar general - across from the local post office! You can also bet that most people can’t afford to shop anywhere but Walmart and Dollar General.
I am part of that demographic. I live 60 miles from a Walmart. DG is often a worse value than say a Walmart depending on the item. Some of DG's item's are so much more expensive by volume. Dollar Tree is even worse, but they have little competition in that area
I know exactly the kind of place you are describing and im sorry you live in a place like that.
@@mind-of-neo Living in "the sticks" is fukin awesome! Nobody to bother you.
Minor correction: Ben Franklin was an exisitng early chain of true 5 and dimes. Sam bought a franchise Ben Franklin before opening his first true store that would become the Walmart we know today.
I remember growing up in Hawaii in the 60’s. Ben Franklin is the closest store where we could do our shopping.
I used to work in a Walmart Distribution Center. You were pushed hard for production, but the pay was great, as were the hours. Production wasn't hard to maintain. If you were in "Receiving", you would open the trailer door and pull freight off. You'd then scan said freight, find out whether or not it needed to be rearranged. In our DC, we were to "downstack" any pallets exceeding 6' in height for safety, also to accommodate the facility. If you were ever injured for any reason, in or out of work, I believe it was their policy to see to it that you were effectively furnished light duty assignments until you were able to get back to your post. I enjoyed my time there, however I would never go back to that work.
How long ago did you work at Walmart?
LOL your DC actually cared about how things were arranged? I watched the guys at my store unload a truck a few times and the pallets that were on the back of that truck were all screwed up. Half of them were poorly wrapped, some of them were so tall they touched the ceiling of the truck and when they tried to move them they fell over, The worst ones were usually the ones that had laundry detergent on them because they would be falling over with the detergent busting out of the boxes and leaking all over the inside of the truck......
I saw this happen many times and the back room manager said that it was pretty common.....
Worst thing about big box stores and the most ironic: poor selection. Before, if you went to a specialized mom & pop tool store, you would have a big variety of tools. If you went to a mom & pop lamp store, there would be countless varieties of lamps. But the Walmarts and Targets of the world want to have EVERY KIND OF THING, so within each TYPE of thing, there is usually only 1 or 2 varieties and that's it.
Sure, but big box hardware stores also exist too.
@@overbebAnd big box furniture stores.
Specialty store specializes. Who knew?
If some items are common, practical, or popular, it's fine. Walmart discontinues and updates items and styles. Which I don't like when items discontinue. There's still small and specialty businesses.
But if you go online they have everything! Overhead
My grandson's first job is a cashier position at our smallish grocery store. He can't comprehend when grown men took being a bagger seriously. My how things have changed in my lifetime!
And that bagger could support a family back then.
It’s funny how you describe “full service” stores in the beginning. It’s come full circle with internet shopping….with the computer acting as “the merchant”😊
Not to mention shoplifting gangs leading to many self service stores locking down their merchandise to a point where one needs a store clerk to fetch even moderately priced items. I find it easier to shop on line and either have the items delivered or pick them up myself.
@@markbrown8097many stores have always kept this concept.
I think online shopping is self service.
@@markbrown8097 Online shopping has its own problems. Such as some people saying they couldn't contract customer service over lost packages for months. So they lost their items and money. There's also constant online deception or misunderstandings, broken items, stolen packages, and excess packaging waste. Some people enjoy browsing in stores.
In 1990, I was employed at Walmart, where an interesting practice took place. Periodically, three of us employees were assigned a unique task. We were sent to a nearby Kmart store in the same town with the purpose of recording prices for a specific list of items sold at Walmart. The management at Walmart would utilize our gathered price information to strategically lower their own prices below those of Kmart. This practice occurred every week, specifically during slow days and before noon when the majority of shoppers were occupied with work commitments. Interestingly, throughout this entire process, we never faced any inquiries or suspicions from the Kmart employees.
It's really interesting to see how unique Walmart's building design is, and it explains why, when Walmart abandons a location, virtually nobody can reuse the space. My home town made an unfavorable decision that caused Walmart to close their location (I believe they wanted to raise their business tax from 0% lol) and the building was abandoned in less than a month. It sat for sale for a very, very long time before finally being demolished. It was simply too huge, empty, cheaply made, and thin-skinned to easily turn into anything else in an economically viable way.
I'm sure the local businesses and citizens benefited from the Walmart closing.
@@JeremySpidleThose that had survived Walmart moving in in the first place.
@@JeremySpidle as a matter of fact, it did seem to improve things for local business, and as this Walmart was located in a reasonably dense urban area, its loss was not a disaster.
But the other important thing to consider is that the town as a whole benefited greatly by kicking out Walmart. After being torn down, it has been replaced with medium and high density housing and numerous small shops in an effectively mixed use development, which increased revenue per acre immensely over the single monolithic Walmart which was almost totally unproductive for the city as a whole.
One trip to walmart is more efficient and quick than going to 10 different smaller businesses.
@josepheridu3322 Whatever you've got to tell yourself, I guess.
My favourite story of Walmart is when they tried to open in Germany. It failed horribly straight away. One of the reasons the Germans rejected Walmart was because they found the smiling and the greeting from the employees very off-putting. Somehow, the Walmart executives had forgotten that foreign countries had different cultures and wouldn't respond well to such an American approach.
Germans don’t tolerate bs lol
@@JokeswithMitochondria I was curious about your username so cIicked on ur profiIe. Wasn’t disappointed lmao
yes being an npc such an American approach.
@@sterlingarcher8041their entire profile is mood lmao
Walmart employees smiling? LOL
Great video Stewart, Nice to see how you tie everything together, how the architecture is not just individual buildings, but an entire network spanning the continent.
The videos you make are unmatched in every fashion. I really appreciate the time and commitment you put into telling the story as a reputable source. Thanks again for providing a great video to watch.
Walmart's key innovation that made the business explode is data-mining. Early adoption of computer data technology that totally controls and optimizes the flow of their products.
The scary thing is that they know things about their customers that their customers don’t know about themselves.
Nope. It was them bribing the Clinton’s to sign that free trade deal with China. No one gave the Clinton’s more money than the walton family. Ever noticed how Walmart has a Clinton vibe?
Walmart's old retro architecture was kind of interesting & funny sometimes then the one we obviously have now.
Excellent video! Very interesting, I used to work at Walmart back in the 90s and some of the points you hit are spot on. When I worked there everything was drop ceiling and tile floors. Now it's open ceilings and polished cement floors and the removal of carpets. The floor plans very which is strange because most of the stores vary in cubic feet.
Walmart put my family's business under Mott's 5-10. I was a kid when it happend in the 90's andremembere traveling with my father around the state to do inventory at the stores. With the way things are today I certainly miss Mott's for it's simplicity and small size.
With the rise of shoplifting and the locking up of sections of the store self-service is becoming more difficult.
Walmart is the biggest thief, stealing from the employees. Always expecting more and more work to be completed in the same 8 hours for no additional pay ! You can NEVER do enough for that company and it is NEVER good enough, ALWAYS FINDING FAULT with EVERYTHING !
Some people like self service. Such as for being able to bring your own container, like at a food counter, to prevent waste.
I disagree. The cost analysis would show theft/loss beaten out by cost of reducing human resource, ie paying a checkout worker.
With 29,000 Gigawatts, Walmart could also send nearly 24,000 Deloreans back to 1955.
Or back to 2015!😉
Aah but Deloreans need jigawatts XD
Great Scott!!
@@briansierzega Martyyyyy!!
This is a common misconception.
Hey Stewart, would you consider making a video about Chicago's two and three-flats? They seem like such a great solution for dense family-oriented housing in our cities. Thanks for another great video! ✌😁
Horrible way to live, why would you even suggest that?
@@petebusch9069 As an alternative to sprawl in our urban centres. You see, building exclusively low density rural infrastructure in our cities is causing a housing affordability crisis while also costing tax payers more money to build and maintain the sprawling infrastructure required by that low density infrastructure. That said, if you have an alternative idea, I'd be interested to hear it! 🙂👍
@@petebusch9069living in a flat is great. It's medium to high density, and often as much space as a small single family home, quite a bit more than most apartments. Almost always also gives you a yard.
They fill an important niche as apartments and condos.
@@oddlyoaktree Cramming people close together is not the answer and results in high levels of crime that costs us more than basic infrastructure. There is no housing affordability crisis, that's a made up term you learned from the media. What we have is a corrupt government crisis stealing all of our money purposely creating inflation. Despite all of that to get into the housing market the best and one of the oldest ways is to buy a small but decent house and put the sweat equity into it but unfortunately most people these days are allergic to actual work so they don't take advantage of that. Please define what "affordable housing" means to you. What does this property look like in your mind and what should it cost?
I was a longtime Walmart customer & endured alot of the lesser aspects, but the last straw was self-checkout. Nothing is worse than grocery shopping with a full cart and then self-checkout. So I haven’t been back to Walmart since.
Realize self checkout is the next normal thing. You aren't changing anything. Look at the Wright brothers' adapting to changes
@@teresasalisbury4748 i did change the grocery store I goto after having been a longtime Walmart customer. Self checkout was too burdensome for me without benefit especially given the choice of other stores that still have traditional checkout.
Way to go! Three weeks and going on banning them. After I found out and saw the Nick and Charles graphic book on the shelves I have not been back. Called cooperative office and spoke to them. It takes longer to find what I need in other stores. I am finding wonderful hidden stores I did not know about. Yes, it is more costly in time and gas yet they will not get my business.
Ask yourself why they’ve gone that route. Because lazy entitled zero skill, zero educated cashiers think they should get $25 an hr. Walmart said no. Period. Now you do it. And you’ve done the right thing by choosing not to go if you don’t want to check yourself out.
COVID helped retailers decide to go big in the online purchases. Our local Walmart sectioned off 1/4 of the store just for online purchases.
Soon we will see Walmart revert back to full-serve layout in certain neighborhoods😅
Simple solution hire armed marks men to keep the bad boys in check!!!😆
A Karen walks into a full service Walmart, hands over a list w/o looking at the person.
Then spends the whole time wailing about everything being wrong holding up the everybody.
Moral...don't tell Karens about full service Walmarts!!!!!!!!!!!
They already are, if you use their online app and pick up or have your order delivered.
Already happening in Atlanta
@@hackman669 I understand but I would prefer to avoid giving companies militias.
The self service model is also a huge factor in why we have so much single use plastic. When the product doesn't have to sell itself you can get away with alot more. So much of packaging is over done just so the consumer can see it or prevent theft.
- a packaging engineer
A comedian did a routine about the amount of packaging associated with stick chewing gum.😀
I agree and packaging today is horrible. Anyone for the environment AND drinks bottled water really needs to have their head examined.
Do you remember the CD long box? That helped record stores reduce theft and at the same time, two rows of long boxes could fit into the former LP racks. Was a major pain to open the plastic ones. Was astonished at HMV in London many years ago when they just sold the CD in its own small packaging.
“Packaging to reduce theft” means hard or next to impossible to open when very senior citizens get their purchased product home… !!
They are being victimized once again by society.
One major thing I find so frustrating is if you do not bag an item, Uncle Cecil wants to see your receipt like you stole it… no logic whatsoever, if I were to steal something, you’re saying all I have to do is pop it in a bag? Ok then! 👍
The data link between the stores and the headquarters not only facilitates the exchange of data like sales and inventory, the air conditioning in each of the stores is also regulated from Bentonville.
And gas pumps can't be turned on by anyone in the state at 5:29am as you stand there and wait for computer a 1000 miles away to turn on your pump for you
There is nothing that happens in a store that Bentonville doesn’t know about.
Great Video. I started my career doing Prototypical Architecture for a Grocery Store chain in the Southeast. Architecturally, we operated very similarly to what you showed.
This is such a fascinating video Stewart!
This was incredible! Great work, Stewart - I really thought this was fascinating
What's interesting is the battleground of shelving, where companies will pay higher premiums to have their product shelved at eye level as opposed to the top or bottom, with bottom spots typically being the cheapest.
My eyes automatically go to the bottom shelves, because I'm cheap! Great Value store brand is just as good or better than many name brand stuff. It saves a ton of money.
@@Josh-yr7gd great value is crap lmao
Wow the satellite fact baffled me. Thats wild
Love the video but the satellite image just seems way off - there are more neighborhood markets in Tulsa than would fit in that area of the box.
I just went to Bentonville for the first time. Nicest Walmart's, and it's clear they run the town. Hundreds of buildings, and lots of close relationships with the local town clearly. But the mountain biking infrastructure they've built there was amazing not a fan of Walmart but they've made the town of Bentonville very cool
Walmart had to make a lot of other towns uncool to make Bentonville “cool”.
and they have FORMAT music festival
I used to live in Nixa Missouri which is a few short miles from Springfield and the walmart in Nixa was the nicest walmart I've ever been in and my Mom and I when we were living there bought everything there from groceries to a lawnmower and everything in between. But this was almost 20 years ago.
Live in the NWAR area the Walton's have contributed a lot to the area. like you said good and bad.
I don’t shop at Walmart anymore, but enjoyed this video! I had no idea how strategic most of the things you mentioned are. It’s fascinating! They also make 2 products under their own name that really tempt me because no one else offers a comparable option: their green antacids and their tuna fish 😂 how weird, but it’s true lol.
LOL I gave muh kitties a can of WM tuna recently. I remember thinking, that tuna looks quality.👁️🐯
Farts ..
So great to see your new video! thank you!
Walmarts tend to just be the simplest commercial boxes possible.
Interesting tidbits of architecture to chew on throughout the day, thanks for the content.
Really interesting Stewart. Thanks.
The Walmart Distrubution Center where I live (Red Bluff California) has a HUGE windmill on the property which powers the building.
That sounded cool and looks pretty cool.
A tad unfortunate the first pictures easily showing it are related to 2 people being shot.
Any idea if its owned by them or if it's like how farmers will loan out land to windmills (which is in turn just like farmers deals with oil companys) getting a cut of the product. Is the town just very windy and was economical to build? I presume some environment laws probably helped encourage it in the state.
Got to thank you, this leaves me with alot of questions and and inspired.
I said cut of the product after oil which I realize technically wrong it be cut of the profit not product
Great video friend. I highly recommend you do a video on Wal-Mart's self check out system.
2:05 With all the retail theft nowadays, and retailers locking up so many items, how long until retailers go back to full-service 🤣🤣
Excellent video. Thank you. I deliver to WalMart Distribution Centers on occasion as an over the road truck driver. The best place for me to get groceries and supplies is at a WalMart because I can park the truck and trailer there during the day. During the day...
Walmart is becoming super expensive here. It is no longer a discount store with cheap prices. It’s mission has changed.
No, they have to combat other things, like theft. We all pay for the people stealing
It looks like you used some footage from my local store at 8:26. Pretty cool!
Stewart, I love watching your videos with my daughter. The are both informative and enjoyable to watch. It reminds me of watching This Old House with my brothers growing up.
Great vid! There are many towns in the US where the ONLY Traffic Light is at the WalMart; and of course it’s on the edge of town!! Efficiencies drive everything; I understand those unique sinks in the restrooms are designed to reduce water consumption, and now found in other places like highway rest stops. And the phone app? Yeah, they know your purchase habits!
Hey Stewart, you should make a video on highway rest areas. I thought the Anchor Lake rest stop in MN was really cool as a kid.
You should check that US map at 5:31. What happen to Michigan’s Upper Peninsula? Is it now part of Canada?😂
Maybe Walmart bought it.😀
For a second I thought I was watching a CNBC video about Walmart, but realized it wasn’t. Great job on producing this informative video man, the quality is top-notch!
I lived in a small town in east Texas and not only did we live in Louie Gohmert’s congressional district, we lived with 30 minutes of 6 Walmarts.
interesting, that walmarts uses skylights and counts on daylight for the shopping experience. it really shows in the pictures imho, and thinking about it, i have seen never a big format store here in germany (we got that trend in the last 30 years running) that had some.
Fun Fact: At least when I worked there in the 2010's, all Sam's Clubs Nationwide had their Air Conditioning controlled by the main office in Arkansas. Frustrating stuff.
An even funner fact. When I did my Stint at Best Buy in 1994-6 all Best Buy stores' heating/air conditioning was controlled from headquarters in Minnesota. It sure was fun to have heat running during a heat wave. Nothing new with remote controlled HVAC.
It's still that way even for normal Walmarts.
Awe, poor baby had to work in a mildly warm building.
@@petebusch9069 Yep. It was +110°F outside and inside the store it was about 91°F inside. If you think that is mildly warm good for you pops.
@@albear972 No big deal, stop complaining.
Insightful video. Thank you.
very informative, ty !
FAB stock footage! Great job.
If you were talking about Wal Mart's architecture in the same way you've talked about other buildings the only brilliance I see is the stores' bility to trigger my depression. I'm fine with minimalism, but Wal Mart's proper version sends me running for the prosac.
Wooo Fairmont Walmart!
I was watching this over lunch in the smaller 10,000 person town that is Fairmont (it's considered a bigger town out here.) It surprised the heck out of me to see the name on the blueprints. Never in a million years did I think I would see the town name in one of your videos. This isn't an area that's well known for architecture.. I will be traveling to Chicago and am excited to look for things in buildings there that you have pointed out.
In the future, it will be interesting how online shopping will change the retain formula. What I've witnessed, the correct input of data is vital and seeing many things of error at store level. Another thing witnessed is how products are forced upon the customers.
They have closed some Walmarts to the public and only use them to fulfill online orders.
Very good and interesting video. 👍 Thank you.
walmarts around me are closing down after decades in rural towns because there's not as much foot traffic in the towns as there was 30 years ago, that they caused, we're so screwed dude.
Guess it's back to Dollar stores and small specialty shops and online shopping?
@@hackman669 Amazon has rural USA covered. Thankfully Elon is actually doing good with a cheaper better satellite options.
This was fascinating! I worked in one of those prototype stores. I actually do love the stores creative displays. Not sure what they intended to study, but they managed to collect the soberest bunch of crazies you could meet. All good, hardworking people. But oh man.
If they wanted to test the sturdiness of displays, we had a janitor that knocked out every one on a regular basis. I remember having to help pick up gift cards so many nights XD
It was a nice break from the usual duties. I almost came to welcome it!
Our store often got painted wild colors. I remember a particular yellow over bakery that I didn't hate. I was surprised to see it slowly creep into other stores in much nicer ways.
I live by one of the prototype stores (as well as 6 others with 35 minutes) and it’s interesting to see the ideas they implement.
Where is that satellite clip at 6:16 from?
Insightful, indeed brillliant, as usual
ILOVE WALMART SAMS CLUB N DOLLAR TREE STORES FR THE PRODUCT SELECTION N FRIENDLY HELPFUL STAFF KEEP UP THE GREAT WORK YALL GOD BLESS🎉🎉
You should do a video on Ikea.
I mean, weirdly where I live - theres the Antioch Gladstone Walmart, and then a neighborhood market down the road a bit. Not far enough apart I think, and its only slightly smaller.
as someone who lives near downtown Detroit… there are no walmarts here, having to travel so far to one keeps me from shopping there like EVER lol
90% every day!! Just-in-case scale with just-in-time logistics is wild to me
In my town, the Walmart resembles a ghost town, with the exception of its bustling grocery section. As soon as you step away from the groceries, a sense of solitude envelops you. It seems that the once dominant big box store concept of Walmart is rapidly losing its relevance, reminiscent of the fading era of 1990s malls.
I’m a fan of your videos and I’m a subscriber. That being said, I’m not much of a fan of Walmart. I did watch the video. And as usual, it’s well done. But Walmart has plenty of negative aspects to it. I’m a city person, so I have plenty of other options, unlike a lot of rural folks, but I think their business practices, their cheap imported merchandise, the way that they treat and pay their employees, and their negative effects on surrounding businesses are well documented. I know the subject matter you cover is not in that realm, but I couldn’t help feeling obligated to say something. They’re definitely not all roses and sunshine.
I'm certainly not praising walmart here, just trying to shine a light on how significant it's scale is and that we should pay attention.
I’m from Alabama, I never noticed just how much competition Dollar General has created for the Walmarts here. There’s atleast 4-8 DG where there is an existing WM in a given area
Uh ohh Alabama..
You didn't mention the under ground tunnels and bunkers connecting Walmart stores. Missed architecture there
The WHAT
I had no idea Walmart invented self service. I didn’t even know full service was a thing outside of pharmacies
Walmart didn't invent self-service. It didn't invent self-check-out either. Google it.
i thought piggly wiggly's, the grocery store did that
A&P Was doing self service and supply chain integration decades before the inventor of Wal-Mart was even born.
We Appreciate you from Philly 🫴🫴🫴
What’s funny is: Walmart’s buildings were union built in our state, till about 15 years or so
What a good video to be recommended at 2 AM
Zellers, Woolco, Kmart, Sears Woolworth many other stores had to be close down for walmart to take over here in Canada i would not think walmart would have made it if the other store would allow to stay open here in Canada
Old
Can’t wait for the Walmart Campus. I was able to go into the mills and see the mass timber that will be a part of the Campus.
great value spec
When Walmart first opened in my area they used the sky lights during the day. Now they have the lights on all the time
I hesitated to watch the video but it turned out to be oddly interesting.
Well done
There is a target, Walmart, bed bath and beyond, and a few other similar stores all pretty close too each other near me. Walmart is by far and away the busiest, always.
the omission of the Upper Peninsula of Michigan on the map at 1:42 and other times ( 5:42 )is interesting... may want to fix that.
It's interesting that Walmart looks so cheap inside compared to Target but has so much more money! Imagine how nice Walmarts could be if they made the inside more comfortable instead of walking inside a big box. Target has a different atmosphere and I feel like it's due to the environment. When people feel more comfortable in their environment then they tend to act nicer (or at least its just a theory)
Prices would be higher tho
@@AgentOffice heaven forbid a company ever lower its margins 🙃
@@ashereaton7443 they're maga so no
@@ashereaton7443are you willing to reduce your margins with your income to save money for the people who give you your money?
Margins are important as a buffer for difficult times. If they didn't have a comfortable margin they'd have to hire and fire people, and open and close down stores a lot more often depending on wider economic factors.
One of the reasons they have been so successful is likely due to being very wise about the margins they choose. If others did it better they would be more successful.
You’re pretty entitled. Bohooo the store isn’t pretty but I want dirt cheap prices.
We have no Walmarts in NYC, only Targets. Many Targets!
I miss the Smiley Face Mascot. It was everywhere, on balloons, stickers, discounts, and more. It's etched into America's brain🙂🙂
4:43 pls tell me what accent this is for him to say unetted states
What about it's impact on communities, how it erodes city tax revenue, increases people's reliance on cars, and they force the bankruptcy of many local businesses and downtown centers due to it's monopolistic tendencies. They don't use architecture to give the customers a more comfortable space, they use it to manipulate and make more profit.
So true and that even with their vast wealth they don't pay the employees properly and many have to be on food stamps just to survive. Totalling $6.2 billion a year in tax
"force the bankruptcy of many local businesses and downtown centres" is a very uncharitable way of saying "provides lower prices for goods". The car dependency part is very true, but in general I wouldn't criticize them for allowing poor people to afford more goods.
Whilst I agree with you, I don’t think that was the focus of the video. Something can be genius and still be detrimental to people.
@@aidancollins1591Walmart doesn’t pay a living wage, those low prices are subsidized by welfare to Walmart employees
@@1981menso Sure, but I could say the exact same thing about small businesses, which pay even worse. The key difference between Walmart and small shops is economy of scale, that's where the savings is given to the customer.
Interestingly, in Egypt, they have mostly self-service stores, but the suspicion of consumers touching there products remains.
Will you be doing a video on the architecture of Crystal Bridges? Let me know if you're coming to Bentonville!
I don't really get the brief emphasis on tilt up and EIFS, because the typical Walmart wall system is the cheapest possible--8 inch block with pumped in foam, fun fact, specifically the product Core-Fill 500. Concrete would never be seen on a modern roof, no clue why you said that. Also, would've been cool to mention the ESFR sprinkler system.
This is the content I browse CZcams for
I am confused by, "The tall ceilings helps regulate temperatures" at 10:40 because I'd expect it to stratify with warm air at the ceiling and cold air at floor level unless there are fans actively mixing up the layers. The video at this point shows the outlet registers on the HVAC pointing sideways, not down which will be fine in summer as cold air falls but in winter, it is not clear to me how it stays comfortable at ground level - unless they have underfloor heating.
The 29,000 GWh of power consumed (at 10:56) is amazing.
You forgot to mention how Walmart forced thousands of small family owned local businesses to close. A small town may not have any other store. Now Walmart has zero competition, and prices keep going up.
As a former small business owner, and former single parent, now retired on low income, when a small biz can't afford to exist, don't ask customers to enable them. That's business!!!
the reason walmart and amazon became as big as they are is because americans wanted the cheapest products for "selfish reasons". so the people contribute to wiping out their neighbors who owned businesses
SO TRUE
Dollar general is pretty competitive
What's that got to do with architecture?
Nice video, but there's a typo at 10:54, it's Gigawatt*
You know, as a Texan still frustrated by the lack of concern by Ercot, and being told I need to keep my thermostat set on 78° when it’s 100°f with a feel like temp of 105° I think we should have Walmart notch up their thermostats, especially at night, turning off all unnecessary power using components in the store and around the parking lot. Now that they are no longer open 24 hours, why does the entirety of the parking lot need to be lit up? Gratefully I live in a community that recognized electric wastefulness as well as light pollution and stores like CVS, Aldi, Auto Zone etc. Are completely dark when they are closed. Follow suit Walmart, even the night stalkers only need the front portion of the parking lot lit up for their safety, and I’m sure a portion of the lighting can be reduced. The power used is that of 21M homes? Let’s share some of it!
Overnight shift workers stock in reduced lighting. Parking lot is lit for safety of employees. Behind store is lit for receiving shipments through the night.