Strategic Objectives of Walmart Assignment Report

2000 words

RUNNING HEAD: WALMART
Name of Student:
Name of University:
Author Note:

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Executive Summary:
Walmart is a well-known brand when it comes to the retail industry. The company is an absolute
example of accomplishing success by following the strategic objectives that has been chalked out
by them for gaining competitive advantage. The report analysed the mission and vision of the
company as well as their strategic objectives. It found out that there are strong relation between
the objective and their missions and one is complementary to the other.

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Contents
Executive Summary:........................................................................................................................1
Introduction:....................................................................................................................................3
Overview of organisation and industry:..........................................................................................3
Mission statement of Walmart.........................................................................................................4
Vision Statement..............................................................................................................................5
Critical Examination of the strategic Objectives:............................................................................6
Wal-Mart’s generic strategy for competitive advantage.............................................................7
Wal-Mart’s strategies for Growth:...............................................................................................8
Recommendation and Conclusion:..................................................................................................9

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Introduction:
It is obvious, that an organisation will have some definite goal and objectives that will guide
them in their actions. In the present scenario of business, where the globalisation and competition
are at the heart of the situation, it is not enough for a company to develop their objectives based
on their basic requirements (Ellickson,2016). An organisation needs to analyse their internal as
well as external environment and strategise their objective in order to accomplish their vision and
mission. The following report will analyse the retail industry through the strategic objective
examination of one of the reputed name in this industry, Walmart.
Overview of organisation and industry:
Retail industry refers to the industry that is concerned with the activity of selling goods as well
as services directly to the consumers or the end users. This retailing or the process of selling
takes place through multiple channels of distributions with the aim of earning profit (Pantano,
2014). A supply chain is generally entrusted to identify the demands to the retailers. In modern
times the retailing industry has evolved wherein they incorporate a variety of strategic level
decisions that includes the type of stores, which market they will be serving, the optimum
assortment of products, nature and extent of customer service and the overall market positioning
of the store. In the preset era of digital technology, maximum number of retailers is trying to
reach a broader market through a number of channels mainly online retailing. The digital
technologies are more preferred and are advantageous for the retailers since customers tend to
choose this because o the ease of marketing (Zolnowski., Weiß, & Böhmann, 2014,).

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One of the well-known retail organizations is Walmart, which is an American
multinational corporation. With it’s headquarter in Arkansas, the company operates a chain of
grocery stores, hypermarkets and discount department store. Named after the founder Sam
Walton the company also operates the retail warehouse named as Sam’s club. According to a
statistics done on January 2020, this company has 11503 stores worldwide. The main products
by the company are electronics, home and furniture clothing, jewellery footwear toys, pet supply,
health and beauty, sporting goods and fitness goods. According to the financial year, 2020 the
revenue collected by the company was US $ 523.964 billion. It is also one of the largest retail
organizations in terms of its employees. From its initial times in Arkansas in 1962, Walmart
developed its retail business with sound financial strategies for achieving its present global
position in the industry.
Mission statement of Walmart
The successes that are associated with the name of Walmart are a direct reflection of an absolute
dynamism by the company projected in their mission and vision statement. The mission
statement of the company goes as “to save people money so they can live better”. This statement
strategically reflects the ideals put forward by the owner of the company Sam Walton. The
strategic decisions put forward by Walmart are the direct reflection of this statement of mission.
By following the statement, the company has made itself clear that the business of Walmart will
include strategies involving price as a selling point for attracting the target segment. The
company exhibits a range of strategies, which signifies this selling point. For example, the
marketing mix as forwarded by the company highlights their strategy of low pricing. In other
areas as well the company focuses on minimizing the selling prices as a means of achieving

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competitiveness. Their main strategy is that consumers will be able to save money by spending
less while buying goods from their store compared to buying the same or similar goods from any
other high end stores. Some key elements can be related to this mission statement by the
company. These are
1. Improving the lives of people
2. Financial liberations
3. Exceeding expectation
In the first component, the company makes itself clear who they value most and the primary
objectives that the company will take for satisfying the needs of this section. The Walmart
explicitly states how they consider offering the best shopping experience as the best means for
serving their client. The second component can be viewed as a direct consequence of the first
one where it focuses on the fact that the customers are gaining optimum liberty of shopping by
increasing their capacity of savings. The range of products in such a reduced price and the
accompanying customer services marks the extra ordinariness of Walmart in the retail industry
Vision Statement
The vision statement of Walmart is “be the destination for the customers to save money no
matter how they want to shop”. The articulation of the vision was officially done by the company
in 2017 at the company’s investment community meeting. Previously Walmart had the emission
statement, which said “to be the best retailer in the hearts and minds of the consumers and
employees.” This change in the vision is a manifestation of the strategic changes that is
implemented by the company in response to the changes in the competitive landscape as well as

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the overall condition of the retail industry. Previously the main corporate vision of Walmart was
becoming the top player in the industry. Presently, however, the vision statement by the
company though incorporates this aim, yet the main emphasis has been shifted on the flexibility
of business in accommodating customers. in relation to the vision statements the following
components can be chalked out.
1. Affordability
2. Customer orientation
3. Convenience
The company effectively recognizes the fact that cost in retail sector has a great impact (Corona,,
2014). Thus by offering competitive price it gains the chance of exploiting approaches towards
the achievement of this vision.
Critical Examination of the strategic Objectives:
The main strategic objective of Walmart is to attain the “competitive advantage based primarily
on low cost and the correspondingly low selling prices of the goods offered to consumers in the
international retail industry. According to the model propagated by Michel Porter it can be
identified that the company uses a strategic objective of cost leadership and their main strategy si
to minimize the cost. This condition makes the company to be able to adjust the selling price
accordingly (Kaliappen, & Hilman, 2013). This ability of selling price minimization is a strength
of the company that helps in having a competitive advantage against other firms. Their objective
of developing their market, product and their market penetration strategy directly helps them in
achieving their missions and visions.

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Wal-Mart’s generic strategy for competitive advantage.
The main objective of the company is to lead by cost minimization. Thus, they apply cost
leadership model which acts as a generic competitive strategy. Because of the ability of
producing low cost products for retail services and the other business outputs the company, in
turn is able to compete based on the low selling prices. As pointed out earlier the lowering of
prices are fundamental strategic objectives that the company uses in their pricing strategy the
Walmart uses the basic “everyday low price (EDLP)” which is the main propagator of their
revenue model (Banke, Mashruwala, & Tripathy, 2014). This strategic objective positively
affects their mission and vision. The incorporation of the EDLP helps the company in achieving
high sales volume by attracting a comparatively large number of customers and thus making the
business a profitable one. The high sales volume is effective in ensuring the profitability of the
company even if the profit margin is thin. Thus this pricing strategy is one of the main
contributor of their strategic objectives which in turn helps in attaining the mission of helping the
customers in saving money and giving them enough freedom to enhance their shopping
experience. The strategic objective of cost leadership also implies the low product
differentiation. The company is thus able to serve all the consumers of different categories under
their segmentation. The company, in order to focus on their objective of competitive objective
relies heavily on the process efficiency, management approaches and other strategies like growth
strategies that provide a crucial role in reducing the prices. Walmart, thus, have the strategic
objective of keeping their prices low which in turn helps them in achieving the mission of
exceeding expectations and the vision of providing convenience to the customers. In applying
this objective, Walmart Company is also able to help the customers in living a better life by

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enabling them to buy most of the required products and commodities for their sustenance. The
low-end customers will find it beneficial to shop in the Walmart because of their value addition.
Wal-Mart’s strategies for Growth:
Market Penetration- the main objective of the company in the case of growth strategies is to
penetrate the market. This refers to their exercise of selling a considerable amount of goods as
well as services to the markets where they have existing operations. In order to achieve this
objective, the company has been more oriented towards the selling f more and value added goods
to the consumers at a discounted price (Chekwa, Martin, & Wells, 2014). The company has
been offering related offers in the wholesale packages with the aim of establishing themselves in
the cost leadership approach. This in turn helps in the growth of the revenue of sales by the
company. This objective helps them in achieving the mission statement as the discounts and
offers makes the company a beloved one for the middle range incomers who are the main target
segment by Walmart (Muda, 2018).
Market Development- in the secondary level, the strategic objective of the company is to
enhance the business growth. The strategy of the market development refers to the process of
offering the services and the goods of the company to the new market. This strategic objective is
primarily associated with their vision of being the leading retail company and being the most
trusted by the customers (Lockrey, 2015). The related objective through the application of
market development is to continue in establishing the company’s presence in the markets that are
new. The inclusion of the online retailing and online transaction is a direct reflection of this
objective. also this helps in fulfilling their vision of being convenient to the customers.

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Product Development: based on the strategic objective of the low cost investment and low cost
selling, the company has minimum investment in the development of the new products. the main
investment on which Walmart Company focuses upon is that of the investments on marketing
and sales. However,, the spends a considerable amount on the research and development for
bringing out innovative ideas of creating products that are durable and sustainable but will cost
less in production.
Diversification: this is the strategy of providing new products to the new markets. the company
has entered recently in 2010 in the video streaming market. the strategic objective of using this
growth strategy is searching for and acquiring other companies that the company can integrate in
their operations. This serves the company in achieving the mission and vision as well. By
incorporating within themselves a variety of companies Walmart will be able to bring to their
customers more service at a lowered rate.
Recommendation and Conclusion:
The vision and mission statement of Walmart is considerably explicit in stating their
objectives in the retail industry. However, in having an ideal corporate mission statement it has
to improve to satisfy the conventional qualities. The statement lacks in detail such as target
customer, information about the products and business concept. The vision statement on the
other hand is quite clear and concise. The strategic objectives as put forth by the company have
been instrumental in attaining their mission and visions. The company’s constant striving of cost
leadership in fulfilling their objectives in low cost production and low cost selling and thereby
valuing their customer’s freedom has been leveraged.

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REFEERNECE LIST:
Banker, R. D., Mashruwala, R., & Tripathy, A. (2014). Does a differentiation strategy lead to
more sustainable financial performance than a cost leadership strategy?. Management
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Brown, J. R., & Dant, R. P. (2014). The role of e-commerce in multi-channel marketing strategy.
In E-Business Management (pp. 467-487). Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg.
Chekwa, E., Martin, J., & Wells, K. (2014). Riding on the waves of sustained competitive
advantage: Consumers' perspectives on Walmart Corporation. International Journal of
the Academic Business World, 8(2), 13-25.
Corona, R. (2014). A comparative analysis of major US retailers based on enterprise marketing
efficiency. Global Business research, 8(4), 25-39
Ellickson, P. B. (2016). The evolution of the supermarket industry: from A & P to Walmart. In
The Economics of Retailing and Distribution. Edward Elgar Publishing.
Kaliappen, N., & Hilman, H. (2013). Enhancing organizational performance through strategic
alignment of cost leadership strategy and competitor orientation. Middle-East Journal of
Scientific Research, 18(10), 1411-1416.
Lockrey, S. (2015). A review of life cycle based ecological marketing strategy for new product
development in the organizational environment. Journal of Cleaner production, 95, 1-15.

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Zolnowski, A., Weiß, C., & Böhmann, T. (2014, January). Representing Service Business
Models with the Service Business Model Canvas--The Case of a Mobile Payment Service
in the Retail Industry. In 2014 47th Hawaii International Conference on System Sciences
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Bibliography:
www.walmart.com