Sam Walton

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**Samuel Moore Walton**

Born:	March 29, 1918 Kingfisher, Oklahoma, USA
Died:	April 6, 1992
Occupation:	Former Chairman, Wal-Mart
Net worth:	$15.2 BillionUSD 1985- 1988 Forbes 400

Samuel Moore Walton (March 29, 1918 – April 6, 1992), born in Kingfisher, Oklahoma was the founder of two American retailers Wal-Mart and Sam's Club. He was the patriarch of the Walton family, the richest family in the world.

1 Early life
2 The first stores
3 Walton's Five and Dime (a.k.a Walton's 5 & 10)
4 A chain of Ben Franklin stores
5 The first Wal-Mart
6 Legacy & death
7 Quotations
8 See also
9 References
10 External links
- 10.1 Pictures

Early life

Sam Walton was born to Thomas Gibson Walton and Nancy Lee Walton near Kingfisher, Oklahoma on March 29, 1918. There, he lived with his parents on their farm until 1923. Sam's father decided farming did not generate enough income on which to raise a family, so he decided to go back to a previous profession of a mortgage man. So he and his family (now with another son, James born in 1921) moved from Oklahoma to Missouri. There they moved from one small town to another for several years. While attending 8th grade in Shelbina, Sam became the youngest Eagle Scout in the state's history.^[1] In adult life, Walton became a recipient of the Distinguished Eagle Scout Award from the Boy Scouts of America.^[2]

Walton excelled physically in high school, playing basketball and football as starting quarterback for Columbia's Hickman High School in 1935, when they won the state title. While at Hickman, he also served as vice president of the student body in his junior year and as president in his senior year. He performed well enough academically to become an honors student.

Growing up during the Great Depression, Walton had numerous chores to help make financial ends meet for his family. He milked the family cow, bottled the surplus and drove it to customers. Afterwards, he would deliver newspapers on a paper route. Upon graduating, he was voted "Most Versatile Boy."

Upon graduating, Walton decided to attend college, hoping to find a better way to help support his family. He attended the University of Missouri - Columbia and majored in economics and was an ROTC officer. During this time, he worked various odd jobs, including waiting tables in exchange for meals. Also during his time in college, Walton joined the estimable Zeta Phi chapter of Beta Theta Pi fraternity. He was also tapped by QEBH, the well-known secret society on campus honoring the top senior men. Upon graduating, he was voted "permanent president" of the class. He was also a member of the professional business fraternity Alpha Kappa Psi.

Walton joined JCPenney as a management trainee in Des Moines, Iowa three days after graduating from college. This position earned him $75 a month. He resigned in 1942 in anticipation of being inducted into the military for service in World War II. In the meantime, he worked at a DuPont munitions plant near Tulsa, Oklahoma. There he met his future wife, Helen Robson, in April 1942.

Robson was the valedictorian of her high school class and a graduate of the University of Oklahoma at Norman with a degree in business. She was the daughter of L.S. Robson, a prosperous banker and rancher. She and Sam were married February 14, 1943.

Soon afterwards, Walton joined the military in the US Army Intelligence Corps, supervising security at aircraft plants and prisoner of war camps. In this position he served in the continental United States. He eventually reached the rank of captain.

The first stores

In 1945, after leaving the military, Walton decided he wanted to own a department store but would settle for a variety store. With some help from his father-in-law with a loan of $20,000, plus $5000 he had saved from his time in the Army, Walton purchased a Ben Franklin variety store in Newport, Arkansas. The store was a franchise of the Butler Brothers chain.

It was here that Walton pioneered many concepts that would prove to be crucial to his success. Walton made sure the shelves were consistently stocked with a wide range of goods at low prices. His store also stayed open later than most other stores, especially during the Easter season. He also pioneered the practice of discount merchandizing by buying wholesale goods from the lowest priced supplier. This allowed him to pass on savings to his customers, which drove up his sales volume. Higher volumes allowed him to negotiate even lower purchase prices with the wholesaler on subsequent purchases. Walton's store led in sales and profits in the Butler Brothers' six-state region. One factor that made this store successful was its central location, making it accessible to a wide range of customers. In an attempt to limit the expansion of his main competitor, the Sterling Store, Walton leased a nearby Kroger store and opened it in 1950 as the "Eagle" department store, but it didn't fare as well.

Due to the variety store's enormous success, the landlord, P. K. Holmes, refused to renew the lease when it expired, desiring to pass the store onto his son. The lack of a renewal option, together with the outrageous rent of 5% of sales, were early business lessons to Walton. Despite the inherent unfairness of forcing Walton out, Holmes bought the store's inventory and fixtures for $50,000, which Walton called "a fair price." .

Walton's Five and Dime (a.k.a Walton's 5 & 10)

Sam Walton's original Walton's Five and Dime, now the Wal-Mart Visitor's Center, Bentonville, Arkansas.

Before long, Walton arranged for another location for a new store. Unable to find a new location in Newport, Walton located a variety store in Bentonville, Arkansas which he would open as another called "Walton's Five and Dime." In Bentonville, the Waltons became involved in numerous civic activities. Walton served as president of the Rotary Club and the Chamber of Commerce.

A chain of Ben Franklin stores

Over time, Walton went on to open more Ben Franklin stores with the help of his brother, father-in-law, and brother-in-law. In 1954, he opened a store with his brother in a shopping center in Ruskin Heights, a suburb of Kansas City. He opened another in Arkansas, but it failed to be as successful as his other stores. Walton decided to concentrate on retail business instead of the shopping centers and opened larger stores which were called "Walton's Family Center."

Walton offered managers the opportunity to become limited partners if they would invest in the store they oversaw and then invest a maximum of $1,000 in new outlets as they opened. This motivated the managers to always try to maximize profits and improve their managerial skills. By 1962, Walton and his brother Bud owned sixteen variety stores in Arkansas, Missouri, and Kansas (fifteen Ben Franklin and the one independent Fayetteville store).

The first Wal-Mart

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The first true Wal-Mart opened in 1962 in Rogers, Arkansas. Wal-Mart eventually became the world's largest retailer.

Walton stated, "Each Wal-Mart store should reflect the values of its customers and support the vision they hold for their community." Wal-Mart has outreach programs led by local associates who grew up in the area and understand its needs. Wal-Mart tries to become involved in local communities by allowing local charities to hold bake sales on store property, and by offering scholarships to graduating seniors from local high schools.

Legacy & death

In 1985, Sam Walton began a program designed to stem the 'tide of communism' in Central America by promoting capitalism and privatization. His efforts included funding scholarship programs to bring Central American students to Christian universities in the United States, hoping that exposure to American capitalist and Protestant Christian values would dissuade them from becoming involved in communist movements.

In 1998, Walton was included in Time Magazine's list of 100 most influential people of the 20th Century. Walton was honored for all his pioneering efforts in retail in March 1992, when he received the Presidential Medal of Freedom from President George H. W. Bush.

Forbes ranked Sam Walton as the richest man in the United States from 1985 to 1988, ceding the top spot to John Kluge in 1989 when the editors began to credit Walton's fortune jointly to him and his four children. (Bill Gates first headed the list in 1992, the year Walton died). Wal-Mart Stores Incorporated also runs Sam's Club warehouse stores. Wal-Mart stores operate in Mexico, Canada, Argentina, Brazil, China, Puerto Rico, and in the United Kingdom (having taken over Asda).

He left his ownership in Wal-Mart to his wife and their children: S. Robson "Rob" Walton, John T. Walton, Jim Walton, and Alice Walton. Rob Walton succeeded his father as the Chairman of the Board of Wal-Mart, and John was a director until his death in a 2005 plane crash. The others are not directly involved in the company (except through their voting power as shareholders). The Walton family held 5 spots in the top 10 richest people in the United States until 2005. Two daughters of Sam's brother Bud Walton, Ann Kroenke and Nancy Laurie, hold smaller shares in the company and are also billionaires in their own right. If alive today, Sam Walton would be the world's wealthiest person, twice as rich as Bill Gates.

Walton supported various charitable causes, including those of his church, the Presbyterian Church (USA). The Sam and Helen R. Walton Award was created in 1991 when the Waltons made a gift of six million dollars which included an endowment in the amount of three million dollars to provide annual awards to new church developments that are working in creative ways to share the Christian faith in local communities.

Walton died April 5, 1992 of a type of cancer called multiple myeloma.^[3]

(Sources: "Made in America", by Sam Walton. *page 329, and #334)

Quotations

I guess in all my years, what I heard more than anything else was: a mere town cannot support a discount store for very long. !!^{[citation needed]}

I'd hate to see any descendants of mine fall into the category of what I call "idle rich"...I hope they'll feel compelled to do something productive and useful and challenging...working on cures for cancer, or figuring out ways to bring culture and education to the underprivilieged, or becoming missionaries for free enterprise in the Third World. Or maybe - and this is strictly my idea - there's another Walton merchant lurking in the wings somewhere down the line.^{[citation needed]}

There is only one boss: the customer, and he (or she) can fire everyone in the company from the chairman and down, simply by spending their money somewhere else.^{[citation needed]}

Sam Walton Quotes

There’s a lot more business out there in small town America than I ever dreamed of.

Individuals don’t win, teams do.

Remain a corporation and retain control if you like, but behave as a servant leader in a partnership.

Money and ownership alone aren’t enough. Set high goals, encourage competition, and then keep score.

Keep everybody guessing as to what your next trick is going to be,” he said. “Don’t become too predictable.

The more they know, the more they’ll understand. The more they understand, the more they’ll care. Once they care, there’s no stopping them.

Information is power, and the gain you get from empowering your associates more than offsets the risk of informing your competitor.

Nothing else can quite substitute for a few well-chosen, well-timed, sincere words of praise. They’re absolutely free – and worth a fortune.

The folks on the front lines – the ones who actually talk to the customer – are the only ones who really know what’s going on out there.

There is only one boss. The customer. And he can fire everybody in the company from the chairman on down, simply by spending his money somewhere else.

The two most important words I ever wrote were on that first Wal-Mart sign, ‘Satisfaction Guaranteed’. They're still up there, and they have made all the difference.

Each Wal-Mart store should reflect the values of its customers and support the vision they hold for their community.

The secret of successful retailing is to give your customers what they want. And really, if you think about it from the point of view of the customer, you want everything: a wide assortment of good quality merchandise; the lowest possible prices; guaranteed satisfaction with what you buy; friendly, knowledgeable service; convenient hours; free parking; a pleasant shopping experience.

If you love your work, you’ll be out there every day trying to do it the best you possibly can, and pretty soon everybody around will catch the passion from you – like a fever.

I probably have traveled and walked into more variety stores than anybody in America. I am just trying to get ideas, any kind of ideas that will help our company.

I think I overcame every single one of my personal shortcomings by the sheer passion I brought to my work. I don’t know if you’re born with this kind of passion, or if you can learn it. But I do know you need it.

Ignore the conventional wisdom. If everybody else is doing it one way, there's a good chance you can find your niche by going in exactly the opposite direction.

I guess in all my years, what I heard more often than anything was: A town of less than 50,000 population cannot support a discount store for very long.

Commit to your business. Believe in it more than anybody else.

I had to pick myself up and get on with it, do it all over again, only even better this time.

I have always been driven to buck the system, to innovate, to take things beyond where they've been.

Capital isn't scarce. Vision is.

A computer can tell you down the dime what you’ve sold. But it can never tell you how much you could have sold.

Don't take yourself so seriously. Loosen up, and everybody around you will loosen up. Have fun.

My feeling is that just because we work so hard, we don't have to go around with long faces all the time. While we're doing all of this work, we like to have a good time.

Celebrate your successes. Find some humor in your failures. Don't take yourself so seriously. Loosen up, and everybody around you will loosen up. Have fun. Show enthusiasm - always. When all else fails, put on a costume and sing a silly song. Then make everybody else sing with you. Don't do a hula on Wall Street. It's been done. Think up your own stunt. All of this is more important, and more fun, than you think, and it really fools the competition. "Why should we take those cornballs at Wal-Mart seriously?"

When all else fails, put on a costume and sing a silly song. Then make everybody else sing with you.

All of this is more important, and more fun, than you think. Don’t do a hula on Wall Street. It's been done. Think up your own stunt.

We’re all working together; that’s the secret.

Appreciate everything your associates do for the business. If people believe in themselves, it’s amazing what they can accomplish.