Wal-Mart (WMT) Lends Hand To The Poor One $2 Meal At A Time

The cynic’s view of Wal-Mart’s (NYSE:WMT) new expansion of its Great Value private label food brand is that it is aimed at making as much money as possible from those who are out of work or work for the minimum wage. The New York Times reports that Wal-Mart is marketing the brand as a way for food shoppers to get good meals for “less than $2 a serving.” It might not be too crass to say that the program is nothing but the big box retailer’s equivalent of the McDonald’s (NYSE:MCD) $1 “Value Meals.”

Or, Wal-Mart might have a big heart. The executive vice president of the world’s largest retailer said the expanded Great Value food line is to help people who run low on money at the end of each month and often cannot buy meals for themselves and their families. There is no reason for him to mislead. Wal-Mart has little to gain from that but bad PR if the statement turns out not to be true.

Wal-Mart has done a great deal to improve its earnings as the recession wears on. It has also gone a long way toward rehabilitating its reputation. Small retailers have claimed for years that they have been run out of business by Wal-mart and its price cutting. Wal-Mart has also been labeled a firm that pays its own workers low wages and gives them paltry benefits.

Wal-Mart is  the largest employer in America. It has not gone through a cycle of massive lay-offs the way that many US companies have. It is entirely possible that it has the best interests of its workers and its poorer customers at heart alongside its desire to make huge amount of money. Low priced meals are a charity of sorts that it not a great deal different from funding the local symphony or ballet theater. The difference is that someone  who is too poor to eat gets a meal from the Wal-Mart program.

Douglas A. McIntyre

Douglas A. McIntyre