What Wal-Mart Knows About Customers' Behavior -NYT

[Rose Siding]

HURRICANE FRANCES was on its way, barreling across the Caribbean, threatening a direct hit on Florida's Atlantic coast. Residents made for higher ground, but far away, in Bentonville, Ark., executives at Wal-Mart Stores decided that the situation offered a great opportunity for one of their newest data-driven weapons, something that the company calls predictive technology.

A week ahead of the storm's landfall, Linda M. Dillman, Wal-Mart's chief information officer, pressed her staff to come up with forecasts based on what had happened when Hurricane Charley struck several weeks earlier. Backed by the trillions of bytes' worth of shopper history that is stored in Wal-Mart's computer network, she felt that the company could "start predicting what's going to happen, instead of waiting for it to happen," as she put it.

The experts mined the data and found that the stores would indeed need certain products - and not just the usual flashlights. "We didn't know in the past that strawberry Pop-Tarts increase in sales, like seven times their normal sales rate, ahead of a hurricane," Ms. Dillman said in a recent interview. "And the pre-hurricane top-selling item was beer."

Thanks to those insights, trucks filled with toaster pastries and six-packs were soon speeding down Interstate 95 toward Wal-Marts in the path of Frances. Most of the products that were stocked for the storm sold quickly, the company said.

Such knowledge, Wal-Mart has learned, is not only power. It is profit, too............

http://nytimes.com/2004/11/14/business/yourmoney/14wal.html?hp&ex=1100408400&en=4600bf878b8f7db8&ei=5094&partner=homepage

[T Bone]

1. Pop Tarts, beer and moral values

What else does Walmart know about those confederate red-staters?

[jdj]

14. LOL

[AuntieM1957]

15. It's not about the Colors!

Hey, ya'll - some us are in the minority in those red states...
And we're here with you, guys. So, kindly lay off the red state slams.

And don't knock that Budweiser Pop Tart casserole until you've tried it! Tastes like chicken.

Seriously, some of us born and raised here still have a fully functioning frontal lobe. Mommy and Poppy Bush came by on the day I skipped my Budweiser dose, and I was able to outrun the ice pick lobotomy.

It's bad enough to have to endure the hate of our GOP loving neighbors. Don't need anymore prejudice, please. Check the hate at the right side of the door.

[madmax]

22. Awe, AuntieM we love ya

ya red-neck little cracker, you! :evilgrin:

:hug:

[leesa]

59. Budweiser Pop Tart casserole!! Too funny!

We don't hate ya, we're just pissed at your GOP loving neighbors arrogance/ignorance. All of us realize there are many intelligent, lovely progressives among the swine.

[Cobalt Violet]

16. WHAT.........no bibles?

No ten commandment Monuments either?????????

How can that be!

[jackson]

26. Boycott Walmart - one of Bush's top campaign contributors

Walmart was one of Bush's top campaign contributors. Some 82 percent of the corporate executive's donations went to Republicans this year.
Not to mention WalMart has many terrible practices: discriminating, union busting, using sweatshops, wasting tax dollars, destroying communities & more.
Check out http://boycottwalmart.meetup.com/ for more info.

I was a big Walmart shopper until this election. Now I go to Target and other places.

[Liberaltarian]

39. I have NEVER even considered entering a walmart...

and never will.
they obviously don't have anything i can't live without, seeing as i've survived this long without them.

[new2004voterWV]

52. Have no choices here

Walmart is the ONLY store we have within a decent drive time from my house. We have a booming population explosion right now, and very little of anything for the people here, besides the houses they live in. We are seriously underdeveloped for the amount of folks coming in. Granted, I wouldn't want to see nothing but stores, etc.. but a choice or 2 would be nice. Walmart is all we have. If I want Target, K-mart, Home Depot, Lowes, heck, even a decent steakhouse, I have to travel at least 35-40 minutes one way. I don't have time for that most of the time. We don't even have a mall, or a donut shop here! Stress, the donut shop! I dread any trip to walmart, but for me, it's almost a necessary evil. *sigh*

[givemebackmycountry]

2. Great - That says a lot

Strawberry Pop-Tarts and Beer.
You got a hurricane that just destroyed your house and all of your belongings and what's the first thing you require?

Strawberry Pop-Tarts and Beer.

Good God.

No wonder why we can't figure these freakin' people out.

Of course the exception HAS to be Florida DU'ers!

[POTGNE]

3. LMAO!

[trogdor]

6. Ooooh, goody! I get to play Devil's Advocate

Back before we had reliably clean water, beer was the beverage of choice. Pop Tarts, while they're not exactly the best thing to eat, are highly portable and have a long shelf life. There are lots worse things to have around in an emergency.

I now return you to your previous programme of Red vs Blue.

[freeplessinseattle]

20. before drinkable water there was...beer???

what did the children drink, I have to wonder...

[tblue37]

35. Actually,

children drank beer and wine all over Europe (mostly beer) before there was safe water.

Did you know that one reason France is so associated with wine drinking is that until after WWII, most provinces did not have a reliable supply of potable water. They drank wine becasue it was safer.

[NuttyFluffers]

41. because the rivers of the world originally were beer...

or rivers of sewage before man entered the scene. only these two choices. none others. we all grew up as a species either adapted to drinking raw sewage or beer...

:crazy:

yuhuh, that's right, that's the way it was. all throughout the world, not a single exception. clean water was finally invented in the industrial age, but only for the wealthy. and soon after it was bottled. before we never even knew it was clear.

when i think of a disaster and needing to stay hydrated i think alcohol - a diuretic. because pissing away all my hydration is important in an emergency... yes indeedy. then i load up on coffe and tea after...

[leesa]

60. Well, pop tarts may be portable and have long preservative enriched

shelf-lives but they aren't food, so what's the point. Besides if the toasters not working, they are beyond gross.

No wonder people are so brain dead in this country if pop tarts are considered to be a food source.

[ahem]

7. I bought Pop-Tarts and beer...

I bought Pop-Tarts and beer, though not at Wal-mart. I also bought water, tuna, crackers, bread, peanut butter, granola bars, chips, batteries, hand fans, etc.

You see a lot of us in Florida that were affected by the hurricanes weren't necessarily dealing with damaged homes, but rather weeks without electricity. I bought a lot of foods that I normally wouldn't buy, but without refrigeration I wasn't too picky.

It's stressful to spend long periods of time in a sweltering hot state like Florida with no power. Beer made for great hurricane parties with the neighbors--stress relieving good times, of which we had several. And pop-tarts, which normally gross me out, were a welcome change to a diet of mainly tuna fish. And given how bare most of the stores shelves were by the time the third hurricane hit our area, we were pretty grateful to even get our hands on something like pop-tarts at all.

Just thought I defend some our buying decisions in the hurricane prone areas.

[tsuki]

9. As a native Florida DU'er,

I gotta say, it must be the imports. I wouldn't buy a poptart, strawberry or otherwise, and in a hurricane, with the power out, beer=skunky.

I think these people should evacuate, permanently. Then we'd be BLUE again.

[tkmorris]

10. Delray Beach, Sept 7, 2004

It's 3 days after Frances landed. We were close enough to the eye that the winds were as high here as anywhere else, but the southern eyewall passed just to our north so we received no break in the middle. The winds just changed direction.

It's over 100 degrees inside the house, and the dogs, kids, and spouse have all had just about enough of this. We have no power and they won't even give us a target date for it's return until next week sometime. We have lost our privacy fence and some shingles but the trees that did fall missed the house so we're lucky. Just bored. And HOT. I can't emphasize that enough.

The goods in the freezer are beginning to thaw in spite of all the ice I packed into it to prevent it. We can get more ice now that the emergency center is up and running but supplies are limited and once that thawing starts you gotta eat it or chuck it. All that emergency ice is good for is keeping drinks cold. All the thawing food is good for is hauling out the grill and joining your neighbors in the Great Block Party. You wouldn't believe the feast that gets prepared when the entire neighborhood loses their freezers simultaneously. No one feels like eating of course, but you cook it all anyway; tossing it in the trash is too depressing and even The Shadow doesn't know when they will be resuming trash pick-up again.

I don't think you can understand unless you were here but during that period, with the heat, the boredom, the dark, the uncertainty, the monetary losses we all suffered, well......... times like those call for Pop-Tarts. And beer, yes. I don't normally feed our girls Pop-Tarts much, but in that environment that's about all they could bring themselves to eat. If giving the kids a Pop-Tart while having a beer with my wife over our 1000th game of backgammon by lantern light makes me somehow a bad person than so be it.

[ahem]

17. For us it was scrabble by candlelight...

but you painted the picture perfectly with your post. That's precisely what it was like. Here's hoping we don't get a reminder next year.

[1monster]

18. So what are you supposed to eat and drink when there is no electricity

for three, four, eight, ten, or fifteen days? Bread gets moldy. Cold cuts get really nasty when they don't have a cold place to stay. Milk... let's not even discuss what happens to milk. Orange juice isn't much better.

And remember, in August and September, it is HOT and HUMID in Florida. What would take a couple of days to go bad in a cooler climate can go bad in a few hours down here.

Pop Tarts are so full of preservatives and are so dry that the heat and humidity don't affect them as much. And they don't need cooking or cooling for eating.

As for the beer... well, I don't drink it myself, but I suppose that it is used for medicinal purposes. One's nerves can get really frayed when the temperatures average 95+ and the humidity is off the charts. (A cool shower might sound good, but the water can't be heated at all and a COLD shower on super heated skin almost makes one go into shock.) A good steady supply of warm beer helps mitigate the stress.

It was kind of funny, but the most comfortable part of the day was at night when we lit our oil lamps. The temperature of the room actually got higer, but the flames dried out the air somewhat which was an incredible blessing.

[kdmorris]

45. Man, I would have given a lot even for a cold shower!!

We have a well..no electricity.. no water. But I remember laughing before Frances that everyone was getting beer. I was thinking "Wow..how much can you drink when you need to have your wits around you?".

I'll tell you what, though, there's no other way to go to sleep when it's that hot (Not only was it 95+ and humidity was 87%, but there's NO AIR FLOW if you weren't lucky enough to have a generator). It's a sad state of affairs when you and all your neighbors are outside on the front porches, standing in the rain and celebrating thunderstorms, even though the Mother of All Thunderstorms just wrecked your life! But thunderstorms usually bring a bit of wind with them, and air flow was a blessing.

I still had to go to work and many nights, I would have a few beers just to knock myself out. One of the guys at work said he found that drinking a bottle of wine before bed actually helped because not only did it knock him out, it dehydrated him so that he didn't wake up in a puddle.

I really don't know if anyone can understand just how much it all sucks until they've been there. After going through Frances, when Jeanne was coming, we stocked up on beer and, well, pop tarts (what little we could find). Like my husband said in his post above, if you can give your children some small sense of life not being completely screwed up (even though it was) by giving them a pop tart and that makes you a terrible person, so be it. After the 1000th can of soup eaten out of the can (cause who wants to heat it?), you take what small pleasure you can get.

Next year, if a hurricane threatens, I will stock up on pop-tarts and beer again. And I don't care how it makes me look or who laughs at me.

[1monster]

51. We did that route with the well and no water when Tropical Storm

Gabrielle hit Florida a few years ago. Fifty-one hours and all our neighbors had power back after a few hours (blown transformer... FPL wouldn't believe we knew what the problem was). Since then, our well shaft developed a crack and we had to hook up to county water. :( In this area, once your well goes kaput, you cannot legally drill another well unless you are hooked up to county water. :eyes:

If we ever do drill a well again, I'm going to have a manual pump alternative put on it. You might want to look into that...

In the meantime, go to your local camping supply deparatment or store and buy a camp shower. You can fill it with bottled water. It is slow flowing, but it works when there is no other bathing options.

[kdmorris]

53. Yeah, we did find one of those camp showers

between Frances and Jeanne. It was wonderful! We will probably end up hooked to county water by next hurricane season, though.

You must live close to Delray somewhere. Gabrielle knocked out part of our fence, which we replaced this year finally. Then Frances came and knocked it down again. Maybe we will get it back up by next year :bounce:

[1monster]

55. Up the coast in the Nation's Oldest City...

:)

[Soup Bean]

4. Regardless of Wal-Mart's lovability quotient...

...that's some pretty impressive data crunching. No wonder they're taking over the world.

[kvining]

5. And

I can't even get a lousy receipt for my vote.

[Rose Siding]

12. That says it all

:(

[Neshanic]

8. Pop-Tarts for snowstorms,one under the tire, pop right out of the ditch.

[freeplessinseattle]

21. lol, that's about all they're good for! (and taste nastier w/out a toaster

while granola bars are long lasting (think-hikers) and there should at least be those sugared up Quaker chewy at hell-mart

[Liberal Veteran]

11. They don't know a damn thing about my habits...

...except that it doesn't include shopping at Wal-Mart.

[Stinky The Clown]

25. I'm with ya, buddy

They can die and I wouldn't miss 'em.

[Clovis Sangrail]

13. 460 terabytes

To put that in perspective, the Internet has less than half as much data, according to experts.


gimme a break
Is this just a count of public data available via http ?

The "internet" only having 230 terabytes is a crock; there is far far more data online than that.

[FULL_METAL_HAT]

30. Completely Rediculous!

If the Internets have only 230 TB, then by george, I've got 1/230th of the internet in my own computer!!

Now the real problem is companies using this technology in immoral ways... I recall something about the latest and greatest supercomputer from Cray came out in the early 80s and each branch of the military, army, navy, and airforce, each purchased one -- and American Express bought two!

It's a little scary to think a drugstore (like Walmart) could know personal patterns better than the people themselves. And the worst part is there is little to do to counter the billion dollar number crunching they have.

All the best,

FULL_METAL_HAT

This is my computer. There are many like it, but this one is mine. My computer is my best friend. It is my life. I must master it, as I must master my life. Without me my computer is useless. Without my computer, I am useless. I must fire my computer true. I must shoot straighter than my enemy who is trying to kill me. I must shoot him before he shoots me. I will. Before God I swear this creed. My computer and myself are defenders of my country. We are the masters of our enemy. We are the saviours of my life. So be it .. . until there is no enemy ... but peace. Amen.

[michaelwb]

46. Original

"If the Internets have only 230 TB, then by george, I've got 1/230th of the internet in my own computer!!"

Oh they probably mean original material. If you subtract all the "me too" and "ditto" posts on-line that would easily half the amount of data... :-)

[newyawker99]

54. Hi FULL_METAL_HAT!!

Welcome to DU!! :toast:

[high density]

43. haha, no kidding

For one thing, the "Internet Archive Wayback Machine" claims to have 1 petabyte of data and grows at a rate of 20tb a month.

http://www.archive.org/about/faqs.php#9
http://www.archive.org/web/petabox.php

[VegasWolf]

19. What, no bible sales? What about cheezwhiz? n/t

[Generic Other]

23. We dropped pop tarts on some poor Afghanis way back when

One of our humanitarian shipments, I believe. Is it some sort of survival food?

Maybe people are toasting them on their car engines after the power goes out??

[Stinky The Clown]

24. To me, the real story here is not Pop Tarts and Beer

Its Wal Mart pre-cashing-in on an impending disaster.

I should have thought, what with all their sappy commercials about how wonderful their underpaid workers are, that they would have been bringing in supplies of free plywood and dry ice. Surely they can afford it.

But noooooooo ..... "mine data" and figure out how to make a killing before their customers lose everything to the storm.

Rat fuckers!

[kdmorris]

47. I agree with you.

Instead of calling us all a bunch of hicks and idiots, this is the biggest concern for me. Wal-Mart and Home Depot both made out like bandits because of these storms. It really sickened me. However, at least Home Depot tried to act somewhat like human beings. They actually did go around helping board up the windows of elderly and poor people without charging them. However, I'm not sure if it was just the guys at our local Home Depot or if it was company policy.

Wal-Mart, on the other hand.. ugh.

[jmowreader]

57. It's company policy to do that

I like data mining. Yes, it sounds evil that Wal-Mart actually figured out what people buy for hurricanes, but knowledge of what people are buying now is a very powerful tool in my toolbox.

One thing data mining is really useful for is SKU deletion--deciding what products not to carry anymore. Everyone goes to the store, and everyone's seen one thing sitting forlornly on the shelves. It's got about an inch of dust on it. No one wants it, they can't give it away but no one will step up and say "let's clearance this damn thing and get a better product in here." I have a SKU Deletion Candidacy program in my computer. I can run it across every one of the 1200 things I sell and ask it "what hasn't sold well in the past ___"--one week, two, a month, two, three, six. It will spit out a list. I can then run some other tests on these items: of the things on the six-month list, how many have alternate products in the building that people are buying? How many don't sell because no one knows we have them? How many don't sell because they're pieces of shit and no one will trade money for them? After I evaluate all of this stuff, I move a few things to choicer locations--sometimes you do that and the stuff just blossoms. I train my folks on a few of the other things, and some stuff all you can do is drop the price to one cent, clearance it out and find something new to take its place. Then I do the same thing with the other products. I've completely rid myself of probably 90 things this year; the new stuff I have is doing much better, thanks.

Understand, now, that every time you rid yourself of an item you'll get some old guy come in "why did you get rid of that? I bought that all the time and now it's gone." To which you whip out your handy pad and go "aluminum corners for siding? We sold three of them in the past two years, so we clearanced them all off and gave their shelf space to 16-penny nails." They always start screaming that getting rid of the thing they wanted is bad customer service...hmm, selling something no one wants is bad customer service? I'm not running the Arthur Blank Memorial Museum of Antiquated Building Materials here, folks. I gotta have stuff that moves. Which is what data mining does for you--it gets you to the point where everything turns over in less than a month.

[missouri dem]

27. Bet they don't know much about my demographics cause

I done give up the walmart habit.

[arikara]

28. And what does this mean?

By next October, the company will require its biggest suppliers to tag shipments to some of its distribution centers with tiny transmitters that would eventually let Wal-Mart track every item that it sells.

Are they going to track it to the buyer's address and check on what they use it for?

[crispini]

29. Ah, the great RFID controversy.

Yes, theoretically, that is possible, but they're supposed to disable the tags before they leave the store. That's the theory anyway. Google RFID and see what you get. I think Wired has some good articles.

[arikara]

33. Thanks for the info

Another reason to stay out of walmart.

[neohippie]

49. RFID is a misunderstood technology

Technologies provide us with tools that can be used for good or ill.

Most people fear change, and what they don't understand. The Internet and television and bar codes were all feared, now it RFID's turn.

There are legitimate privacy concerns here, but those issues are also being addressed. I work in distribution and I can tell you that this technology will be heavily in play over the next 10 years. It can greatly reduce the cost of products by eliminating picking, shipping and receiving errors, just like bar coding, which is still being adopted by many companies even though it is an older technology, some things are just slow to change.

Here is an article or FAQ (frequently asked questions document) about privacy concerns and RFID

http://www.rfidjournal.com/article/articleview/1025

[Deja Q]

32. WHy won't Wally World pay for the RFID instead of the 'suppliers'?

Oh yeah, that'll encourage every other store to go RFID too.

As for the RFID tags? Destroy them once you're out the store. Just how small will they be anyway?

[arikara]

34. According to a CNet article:

RFID tags are miniscule microchips, which already have shrunk to half the size of a grain of sand.

and

KSW-Microtec, a German company, has invented washable RFID tags designed to be sewn into clothing. And according to EE Times, the European central bank is considering embedding RFID tags into banknotes by 2005.

http://news.com.com/2010-1069-980325.html

[Liberaltarian]

40. with something that small-

how could they ever actively track stuff outside the store,a nd out of reach/range of their sensors?
half a grain of sand size isn't going to allow for much of an active signal.

some people are way too paranoid about this stuff...tags like these have been in use for years already, and they're generally a lot bigger- about twice the size of a postage stamp. if you looked thru your stuff, you'll probably find one or two...or more.

[Deja Q]

31. Walmart now needs to invent weather control and they'll be rolling in it.

In the long term, is Wally world's new system going to be consistently THAT accurate?

[bhikkhu]

36. Perhaps they know me...

If I have to shop there, I walk in with a frown. If I have to buy anything, I walk out with a frown. If they don't have what I came for, I walk out empty handed, with a smile.

I recall during the first day of "shock and awe", going into a Walmart. Overhead tv's throughout the store were tuned to FOX, and the blue aproned minimum wagers were all in rapt wonder at the breathless reports of the embeds. Being a non-tv viewer, that turned my stomach like nothing else.

[mitchum]

37. I have never given a penny to those lowlife jackals

[grace0418]

38. I would've thought they'd use the weather report

to make sure things WEREN'T available in their stores so they could make people panic and pay any price. Seems like a dirty tactic they would use.

[Gore1FL]

42. Is this necessarily bad?

I mean, I know Walmart has a lot of problems, and a lot of issues. Making sure that they are prepared for known demands doesn;t striek me as particularly awful. It isnl;t tlike they were pushing what they had in stock to victims, but rather determined what the victims were likely to want and make sure that it was stocked.

Sure there is a profit motive, but the bottom line is the shelves filled with desired items did not empty as quickly (if at all) and the hurricane victims were able to buy what they wanted.

I see this as Walmart serving the community pretty well in this case.

[Sun Soldier]

44. Agreed. This is a good use of technology

People flock to stores before any pending storm even if the cupboards are full. Walmart didn't become the #1 retailer in the country due to luck. It's called business savvy.

[DoveTurnedHawk]

50. I Agree

But the privacy issues described in the complete article are rather disconcerting.

DTH

[jmowreader]

58. I don't see any privacy issues in the article

Data mining won't tell me how many boxes of rubbers DoveTurnedHawk buys in a month. (That's Client Relations Management--different technology.) What it will tell me is how many boxes of rubbers are sold in the second week of September when there is no hurricane on the ocean versus how many are sold in that time frame when there is a hurricane out there.

I'd imagine Wal-Mart does automatic stock-level replenishment--we sell six hundred boxes of rubbers every week, so we'll order six hundred boxes of rubbers every week. Data mining will tell the inventory people when to go into the computer and bump that up.

What all of us in retail are trying to do is get to the point when we never have an out-of-stock. Data mining will help us get there better than anything else we've tried.

[Rose Siding]

61. It's bad if you're a small business...

but the "free" market is evolving into one in which only monoliths will be able to compete.

[Gore1FL]

62. I agree with that assessment of Walmart as a whole

But nothing stopped the smaller store owners from speculating what Hurricane victims might need.

I have alot of issues with Walmart, but I have a hard time in this case criticizing their preparedness from either a customer or from a business standpoint.

[RazzleCat]

48. The Big Fear is that they are very successful

So fine, I don't shop walmart, but remember they are the leader. Right now I do the Target when I need a 'big box' store. But you can bet your bottom dollar that as Walmart gets bigger all the smaller fish will follow suit. So you can expect Target, Sears, Best Buy (and any other big boxes) to begin to gather, save and use/abuse all that data. You already know that they are all ready collecting the data (when was the last time you made even a cash purchase with out having to give a zip code or phone number, FYI I just give them any random set of numbers), the difference is that walmart keeps filtering it, and applying it in new ways. So its not that wall-mart is bad, its that what walmart does, all will follow.

[Hokie]

56. I prefer beer with PB&J

It has that home cooked flavor. This was one of my favorite meals when I was still a bachelor. It really freaked out the future Mrs. Hokie.

Seriously, if you ever needed proof that Wally world is run by Satan this is it.

[jsw_81]

63. I was at a Wal-Mart earlier today

What a creepy store! The place just oozes red-state conservatism from nearly every shelf. Everything from the SUV-packed parking lot to the gory, horrific "Passion of the Christ" calendars for sale near the entrance to the prominently displayed Coulter/Hannity/Swift Boat/Savage books (not to mention the "God Bless Ronald Reagan" posters) made it crystal clear to me that Wal-Mart has a definite political bias. The fact that they're apparently tracking my every purchase just makes it even creepier.

I feel guilty about shopping there, but unfortunately I don't have a lot of money right now and there just aren't that many stores in my area. It's almost like I'm forced to shop at Wal-Mart. And isn't that the way they planned it?