Lee Scott American Businessman Quotations

I expect that our associates will walk with a little more bounce in their step and understand that this company is behind them and has respect for them.

We want to set a tone going into our fiscal year that starts Feb. 1, that Wal-Mart Stores is going to be aggressive in taking care of customers, taking care of our associates, communications and merchandising.

In some ways, people forget about average working people, and how they live their lives.

I would guess that any criticism about Wal-Mart could have some element of truth with 1,500,000 people.

Because the truth is our wages are really competitive and they're good.

But they are also better, our competitors are better because Wal-Mart exists.

I think in some ways we have allowed other people to set the agenda. Other people to define who we are.

If we take care of the customers and associates and grow the business, Wall Street will be pleased.

Where we're not wrong or where the cost of settling is so much that it is totally disproportionate to the harm or the error that we made, we're not going to settle.

Retailing, it's always true that there is some items that I wish we had a lot more of like the iPod and there is some items I wish we had a lot less of.

And the greeter is what sets the tone for this company and I've been on TV a little bit this morning.

One of the things that strikes me is so many of the critics are people whose lifestyle doesn't change when the price of fuel changes, or if they keep a Wal-Mart store out of their area.

The beauty of this country and what people participate in is the competitive nature that we allow to exist and the fact is that we are better because we have great competitors.

Where we have been incorrect in what we have done, then I think we have an obligation to settle.

People aren't going to talk about it except me and that is communication and the visits I have personally had in our meetings with our store managers saying if you do these things you will be terminated, period.

I just think that it's maybe fashionable today to try to take individual actions and individual failures and take the broadest possible brush and try to paint a company.

It's hard for us in our stores to be a leader in technology.

Many of them are doing it because they are concerned about smart growth.

Our customer base is not necessarily a leader, an early adopter.

You know, we opened a record number of stores last year.

And what I am trying to say to them that through our ads and through our discussions is if you don't want us in your community, that's your choice, but don't say it's because of wages.

So I think we have an obligation with our size to make sure that we are open to what people have to say to us because the people who criticize us, they're not all mean-spirited.

Don't say it's because of benefits, because our benefits are good.

There are going to be some people who never want Wal-Mart. That's OK.

More and more, more and more digital, in particular, I think you'll see in our stores next year, as we start combining these digital products and they interface with each other, you'll see that represented in Wal-Mart.

If anything, the negative press and the criticism take away the opportunity to feel as good as you can feel about your employment.

Or if you have one store manager that makes a bad decision, is that indicative that that is somehow what your company represents? No.

Because in our clippings I see a lot of articles that are very positive about all the stores that are voted by local communities.

Our size causes us, when we do something inappropriate, which is usually done out of stupidity, to come across as being done out of arrogance.

If you had all the small businesses who employed 1.5 million people collectively, would there be individual instances of issues?

You can't take a store that is a struggling store anyway and add a bunch of people and a bunch of work rules that cause you to even be in worse shape.