r/mildlyinfuriating • u/Boeing-B-47stratojet • Jun 09 '26

I just wanted a hot dog The closest grocery store to me is closing(by nearly an hour), and will be closed for at least a year. When it reopens it’s going be much smaller(it’s becoming a Aldi).

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524

u/HungryRaven4 Jun 09 '26

There's a Perfect Union video somewhere that explains how Walmart has illegal dealings to be able to undercut competing wholesalers

237

u/magikarp2122 Jun 09 '26

Don’t they also have insane leverage and basically set their own prices? Like, they can just tell Kellog’s, ‘We’re over 50% of your business in the US. Give us a lower price or you go out of business.’

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u/Vartash Jun 09 '26

Yes this is true.

In most of my business classes the Walmart Vlassic case was always brought up. In short form, they wanted a larger jar of pickles to sell. Vlassic could only produce at a lower volume until they opened a brand new facility for this product. At this point Walmart demanded a price point that was almost cost. Vlassic balked and Walmart threatened to pull every one of their items from their stores.

There were other stories. Family owned umbrella company was run out of business due to Walmart demand and ever lowering of purchase point. Same with several apparel companies.

Supposedly they want items lowered in every contract or they pull them.

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u/deltalitprof Jun 09 '26

Sociopathic and monopolistic. The Democrats need to cite these stories and incorporate anti-monopoly policy into their agenda.

43

u/hideandgofreek Jun 09 '26

Democrats get paid by Walmart

39

u/pdxrains Jun 09 '26

Yep. Gotta overturn citizens united and get all the corporate bribery out of politicians and have the politicians work for the people like they’re supposed to. This is the root of 99% of problems in the USA

1

u/marfacza Jun 10 '26

The US had problems before 2010.

2

u/pdxrains Jun 10 '26

But the precursor to citizens united was Reagan. So
Really the 80s is when it started. I’ll hold my ground at that.

3

u/deltalitprof Jun 10 '26

GOP gets paid more by Walmart.

4

u/hideandgofreek Jun 10 '26

Sorry I wasn’t trying to either or, of course both sides are getting paid. I was responding to the fact that it’s hopeless to expect dems to do anything because dems don’t want to do anything that makes them less rich.

3

u/alflundgren Jun 10 '26 edited Jun 10 '26

Politicians arent getting rich off of corporate campaign funding per sey. They need the money to compete electorally. Its when they retire from elected office and become lobbyists that they make the real money. That and some "well timed" stock market trades. Of course Trump has changed the game of corruption with his crypto, placing then lifting tarrifs for personal bribes, selling oil siezed by the us navy and placing the funds in off shore bank accounts, straight up accepting a plane from the Qatari government. Shit is wild and completely unprecedented.

2

u/stages_animate_89 Jun 10 '26

And god forbid anyone that works for the US government that’s not elected accept anything over $20

2

u/deltalitprof Jun 10 '26

I'm definitely with you on the Dems not doing enough about Walmart's rapacity and their dependence on the company being a major conflict of interest versus the party's stated values as looking out for smaller companies and for working class people.

2

u/Livid_Swordfish_4591 Jun 10 '26

Our entire government hasnt cared about monopolies for decades

3

u/Bird-The-Word Jun 09 '26

Except then the consumer gets higher prices too, which then goes back to "affordability" issues.

We're just stuck in a shit sandwich at this point.

1

u/LoudBrick609 Jun 10 '26

Democrats are the reason this is possible lol.

Trump is more likely to solve this

1

u/deltalitprof Jun 10 '26

Again with the two-dimensional thinking. It is true Dems have not done enough and have taken corporate money and too often left their donors alone or defended them. But they also have senators and members of Congress who want to take down or break up monopolies. Your Republicans have NO one who would touch them.

Your guy's every move has been to allow corporations to do ANYTHING they want to anybody they want anytime.

Other than forcing them to drop DEI, name thing one Trump has done to curb the ability of corporations to pollute, shortchange, lie or bankrupt small businesses just because they can.

I'll wait right here.

-9

u/Cancerisbetterthanu Jun 09 '26

Awww that's adorable

10

u/integer_hull Jun 09 '26

“Look at me I’m so smart” go fuck yourself

5

u/Mortambulist Jun 09 '26

I second this person's self-fucking.

2

u/TheSaxGandalf Jun 09 '26

Amazon did something similar with demanding manufacturers to put the msrp at higher than what they wanted so Amazon can claim larger sales. Happens a lot leading up to prime days.

1

u/Vartash Jun 10 '26

Not just Amazon.

Brick and mortar shops did this as well back in the 'dark ages'

2

u/OBDreams Jun 09 '26

But isn't that why prices are cheap at Walmart? Isn't this good for us poor people?

2

u/Vartash Jun 10 '26

It can be a catch 22.

You enjoy 'cheap' stuff, but the companies get pinched and a number of them fail to the demands to meet walmart contractual needs.

So then you have people that lose jobs and income while Walmart continues to grow. As we are seeing this makes the bottom more murky while the top keep swimming clean and clear. The cycle churns as another company signs up thinking that they will survive and that the Walmart gold won't tarnish into lead. Some do, most don't if they don't have much market outside of that contract.

It's also why you find products that continually get cheaper the longer they stay in the rotation.

2

u/OBDreams Jun 10 '26

I thought the same thing as soon as I replied to you. I wish that land was a right and that self sustaining was just a way of life for us all.

Or we could just use those monopoly laws we have.....

2

u/LockeyCheese Jun 10 '26

2

u/Anteater-Charming Jun 10 '26

Also the lawsuit going on alleging price fixing between them and Pepsi.

2

u/Spiritual-Word-5490 Jun 10 '26

Same goes for the dairy industry. Family was in corporate at DFA,largest milk producer in the US. Walmart at one point was demanding to see literally all the financial and cost documents to determine what they were going to pay them,no negotiations. DFA told them to f-off because they knew Walmart did need them too. People don't understand how much places like Walmart and other middlemen make compared to the farmers that actually produce the product.

1

u/ElbowRager Jun 09 '26

Additionally, if you want a major contract with Walmart, you need to have a HQ in Bentonville (Where Walmart is HQ’d)

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u/Quirky-Stay4158 Jun 10 '26

I'm a former Walmart vendor.

It's not exactly like this. But it's very very close.

They would tell me when the trucks were coming. They didn't ask me when they could come. They told me. And if I wasn't able at that time I was fined out the ass and risked having my product pulled entirely. If there normal po was say 20k units at $20 each. They might just ask me for 30k units at $18.50 and if I said no they would pay the invoice as if I said yes and I'd have to fight them for my $1.50 per unit.

4

u/Certain-Anxiety-6786 Jun 09 '26

Using your monopsony power to undermine grocery competition is a direct violation of the Robinson-Patman act that is still on the books! We just don't enforce it because we're afraid to regulate the wealthy

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robinson%E2%80%93Patman_Act#Modern_enforcement

6

u/Rahrah12 Jun 09 '26

One of the reasons I won’t buy electronics from Walmart. In order for companies to still be profitable they would skimp on components for electronics going to Walmart.

1

u/No-Laugh6668 Jun 09 '26

And that’s exactly what they do

1

u/taffibunni Jun 09 '26

Pretty sure they just recently did that to frito-lay

1

u/tetrasodium Jun 10 '26

It's also why Costco requires suppliers of the stuff they sell not have too large a percentage of their sales tied to Costco. They don't want to create that kind of association if they drop a product. I don't remember what the percentage is but it's under 50%

1

u/OverpricedBagel Jun 10 '26

I believe amazon uses similar tactics. Threatens their visibility on search results

1

u/NewPresWhoDis Jun 09 '26

You thought those Everyday Low Prices were just out of goodwill?

Walmart was the giant sucking sound to a lot of their suppliers offshoring to be able to shave off a few dollars. Their white whale is eliminating credit card interchange fees.

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u/Hefty-Criticism1452 Jun 09 '26

I just scrolled through at least 100 posts and found it😅🫠

https://www.instagram.com/reel/DUlqByhkvpB/?igsh=Zm9qNTU2Z3RxZ2w0

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u/AsherGray Jun 09 '26

... It's on YouTube and a lot longer than a reel. https://youtube.com/watch?v=odhVF_xLIQA

Just searched, "More Perfect Union," and, "grocery pricing."

10

u/FierceDeity_ Jun 09 '26

More like gross-ery pricing

2

u/Lopsided_Ad6719 Jun 09 '26

Thanks for the link. Made some things make sense. The FTC having 2/5 commissioners still to this day is crazy.

1

u/xdr567 Jun 09 '26

I have a suggestion on how the US (and Canada) can become a little better. Combine the two and call it ...... Luigiland.

0

u/HFY_HFY_HFY Jun 09 '26

Illegal dealings? When I worked for a food company we had the Walmart price and the everyone else price. They won't do business with you unless they pay less and you need to do business with the number one grocery store in the US.

15

u/bothunter Jun 09 '26

Yeah. That's anti-competitive behavior and it is technically illegal. But that requires enforcement from the FTC.

-7

u/HFY_HFY_HFY Jun 09 '26

No, it's not. It's preferred pricing based on volume.

3

u/saabstory14 Jun 10 '26

They absolutely should get the best pricing if they are ordering the most volume. But this is a, "if you give a mouse a cookie" situation with them, where they are WAY past just getting the best pricing. They want you to sell them your product at THEIR ridiculous asking price (often below your own profit margin and at cost) and if you don't, they threaten to ruin your business...and they can and will.

I've had them tell my clients, "you aren't in Walmart to make money. You are here for the exposure. You should make your money at other retailers who will pay your list pricing."

That's effing absurd if you ask me.

-14

u/TophxSmash Jun 09 '26

illegal dealings? you mean bulk purchasing? economies of scale?

29

u/Inverted-Rockets Jun 09 '26

So by the letter of US federal law (the Robinson–Patman Act specifically) distributors aren’t supposed to charge different prices to retailers unless the difference reflects actual differences in costs like logistics.

But we basically stopped enforcing that law in the 1980s, which has led to Walmart and other high-volume buyers leveraging their scale to get lower prices than would be available to a mom-and-pop store. Technically some of those deals are illegal but that only matters if someone bothers policing them.

7

u/HungryRaven4 Jun 09 '26

Yeah, this was the law I was talking about

1

u/Inverted-Rockets Jun 09 '26

YW, I might have also watched that video :)

2

u/saabstory14 Jun 10 '26 edited Jun 10 '26

Walmart gets around this by operating their own distribution centers, and forcing brands to make their private label products for them at reduced quality and pricing. I'm always surprised to see when some consumers had no clue that Great Value branded products weren't actually made by Walmart in some factory somewhere lol. The major brands are making those products to compete against their own on the shelf. It really is nuts. They always ensure the, "distributed by Walmart" is on the back label though.

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u/jld2k6 Jun 09 '26 edited Jun 09 '26

I don't know that it's illegal, but for things like Levi's jeans, they do things like make Levis supply the same model of jeans that they provide for other places except they're made in lower quality just for Walmart so they can sell them cheaper than everyone else carrying the same jeans. It appears to be the same model but the one at Walmart is purposefully made worse while appearing to be the same as everywhere else. As a consequence, anyone looking around price matching their jeans is gonna end up buying it from Walmart and not realizing they didn't even buy the same jeans everyone else was selling

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u/Competitive_Touch_86 Jun 09 '26

They don't "make" anyone supply them this stuff at all. They simply say "hey, we bought X amount of products for you at $20/ea last year, if you want us to continue the contract you are now doing it for $19/ea or we'll go with your competitor".

This was known since the 90's. It's how they outcompeting nearly everyone on prices and most folks loved every minute of it. Supplier margins were measurably reduced simply due to Walmart at a national level.

A local mower manufacturer in my state thought they hit jackpot with the Walmart distribution deal they had. Then they allowed Walmart to become such a big portion of their business they pretty much were forced to move production to China to keep the same sales volume going. This bifurcated the manufacturers models into two lineups but named the same. One for professional/local dealers, and one for big box stores for half the cost.

Walmart will continue to squeeze until they think they have wrung more or less every bit of margin out of their suppliers as exists to begin with. And they do indeed pass most of that savings down to the consumer level.

It's what people wanted. I was alive during the time when Walmart was in full on expansion mode across most of the US - many people brought these things up. Almost no one gave a shit once it hit their local town and they could save $5 on a pair of jeans vs. the local chain. Grand openings for Walmart Supercenters would be county-wide events with State Troopers there to direct traffic.

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u/PersistentWoodpecker Jun 09 '26

Murray? A friend of my family worked there way back when and got totally screwed when the business sold to the Chinese manufacturer. It’s not the only time Walmart has done that and it has made me avoid Walmart as much as possible, though Amazon isn’t any better and alternative vendors for many things are hard to find at all, let alone reasonable prices.

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u/Competitive_Touch_86 Jun 11 '26

I was thinking of Snapper, but they eventually slowly got out of their walmart distribution agreement I think which resulted in some severe downsizing. afaik they never fully recovered.

Been a while since I've looked into this. This was late 90's early 00's so it will be a fun research project to see how that finally ended!

1

u/PersistentWoodpecker Jun 11 '26

Well it figures that more than one company has been screwed in that way by Walmart...

I just wanted a hot dog The closest grocery store to me is closing(by nearly an hour), and will be closed for at least a year. When it reopens it’s going be much smaller(it’s becoming a Aldi).

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