FREE ESSAY ON SAM WALTON

SAM WALTON

There were several characteristics of Sam Walton that enabled him to be successful in his
life and business dealings. Sam Walton could do anything he put his mind to. This can be
witnessed in his ability to transform a small town store into a 25 billion-dollar
industry at the time of his death. Walton did not want to be poor, and this helped to
push him when the going got tough because he knew what the possible outcome would be. For
example, when Walton first started producing more Wal-marts, he was in great debt. In
fact the only way he could get out was to make more stores and continue to set lower
prices than the competition. Walton grew up into a poor environment as a child, so he
knew what it was like to be at the short end of the stick. Perhaps his difficult
childhood gave him something to strive towards later on in his life. Walton learned
several things from others as well. For instance, he learned to economize from his job at
J.C. Penney. And while he was developing his first general store, Walton saw what the
competition was doing wrong, and did the complete opposite, such as selling more quantity
in order to make a bigger profit in the long run. It can probably be stated that Sam
Walton would not have been as successful if his devoted wife had not been there along his
side. Always there for him, Mrs. Walton was able to keep the entire family together
during the hard and difficult times. While Sam was out doing the dirty work trying to
make something of his business, Mrs. Walton was playing the role of mother and father
back at home. 
Sam Walton had to create and develop his business in a very difficult environment.
Competition was all around, and most people saw Walton's store as a dead-end flop when it
first began. Before the founding of Wal-mart, all of the businesses were the same, trying
to set prices in hopes of large gains from not so large quantities. Walton saw what was
going on and took advantage of what he saw. Thinking in terms of volume, Walton even went
so far as to go straight to the wholesalers at early hours of the morning in order to get
the product at its cheapest price. No one would have thought that Walton would have
become successful through his unseen techniques at the time. However as Sam Walton began
to build more and more stores, people's ideas and opinions of him began to change. "Maybe
he is doing something right," they began to say. Eventually Walton and his business grew
to compete with stores such as K-mart and Sears. Walton saw these two large companies as
major adversaries, but still believed in himself and his idea of Wal-mart. So several
years and several hundred stores later, Sam Walton was finally able to make Wal-mart the
nation's largest retailer in 1991. Walton saw this as a great achievement. Just to show
his appreciation, he held special pep-rallies with his employees all across the nation.
His plan was to excite the workers and make them feel like their attitude and
determination were important to the overall idea of Wal-mart, and they really were.
Without the help of the thousands and thousands of dedicated employees, Same Walton's
dream of Wal-mart would not be what it is today. 
I was overly impressed and fascinated with the biography of Sam Walton. Amazed at how a
man who grew up in poverty could make such a large impact on an entire nation. You could
have asked me about Sam Walton prior to my viewing of the video and I probably would have
said that he was a rich tycoon that got lucky. But after viewing the tape, I have
acquired the knowledge and understanding of what Sam had to struggle and go through to
get to where he was. The sacrifices and choices he had to make along the way were
inspiring. I now understand exactly why Sam Walton deserves all due respect for his great
accomplishment. It can definitely be declared that Sam Walton was an entrepreneur in
business. He was not only able to use his talent and search out and take advantage of new
business opportunities, but Walton was also able to develop new ways of doing things,
ways that had never been thought of before. By using his own imagination, aggressiveness,
and hard work, Sam Walton gave birth to a booming industry and reaped the benefits that
would follow, not just in terms of wealth, but emotional gain as well.