The store chain initially said it would not attend White House meetings on gun control, but now they have changed their tune and plan to sit down with the Obama Administration to discuss these policies.
UPDATE: Thanks to UTLaw, we learn that Wal-Mart is taking calls on this issue. You will speak with a live customer service agent, and they claim that they are listening to customer input.
The phone number to call is: (479) 273-4000. Tell them you would like to offer input on their decision to meet with the White House on gun control. You will be passed off the some kind of priority customer service.
I smell crony capitalism. Stand by for the big sell out.
I wonder what sort of implied threats were made….
Time to start calling Walmart?
I take it back. We have no idea what they are thinking.
I was just replying with this: Why? Your local store manager isn’t going to know what to do with your phone call. He/She isn’t likely to even know that Wal-Mart is meeting with the White House tomorrow.
If this ends up being a case of crony capitalism, there are a few things to do. One, stop shopping there if you can possibly help it. Two, if you want to contact the company, send an email to corporate and say that you used to be a Wal-Mart shopper, but now plan to shop at competitors. If possible, name competitors. If you were recently a regular customer, see if you can find any receipts and tally up how much you have spent there in the last few months. If you weren’t a regular customer, but periodic one, tally up how much you have recently spent at competitors and tell them that these are now your permanent shopping preferences. Basically, Wal-Mart really only responds to numbers.
I meant corporate. My local Walmart manager owns a pile of ARs, I think. He pushed to get them added back to his store. They sell out whenever they show up. People drive miles to shop Walmart ammo in our county.
It looks like they were asked strongly, to show up at the White House. Biden wants to look like he talked with everyone.
I know the people running WM today tend to track left, but they make a business selling in red-state country. Hope they are not dumb. If we see them playing the odds, we will need to make sure they know we see their hands heading for the cookie jar. Hopefully it pulls them back from the edge.
Of course, waivers for ACA are being waved in faces nationwide…
That’s all Wal mart does care about is it’s numbers. They would sell their soul to the devil if it meant they made a dollar.
Nothing wrong with that. they are a business. And what they know is that they make a TON of money selling guns and selling ammo. And would take a HUGE hit if they stopped or lost that business.
Know, they got squishy because they thought it would help them enter new markets (ie: NY City and New England) but they quickly wizened up that its not worth blowing the corps business (and losing your core customers) in the hopes of maybe securing new customers.
What I suspect this is about, more than anything, is two fold:
1) for the white house to learn about Wal Mart’s gun check system which is integrated into their overall asset control and inventory control system and which takes a video/image of anyone buying a gun and checks it with their own database of prohibited persons (doesn’t avoid NICS checks, and as I witnessed on Christmas eve, the wal Mart Check is MUCH more efficient than the NICS system and
2) the opportunity for Wal Mart (and other retailers) to develop a system for private sales to be rapidly processed through NICS at competitive prices (and what that cost might be, rather than being forced to go to a gun store which is likely to overcharge you for a background check because you are essentially their competitor in the gun sales market).
Ok, everybody, don’t call stores, call corporate. Here’s the number: (479)273-4000
That gets you the home office. Tell them you want to express an opinion and they’ll immediately transfer you to another line where you will talk to a real person who will take your comment and record the call.
They are getting calls going both ways right now. They said that they have made not decisions going forward except to hear what Biden’s group says and then weigh that with the comments from their customers.
So start calling. Have your family and friends call. Overwhelm their switchboard with calls and we may keep them on our side. We just have to show them that the numbers are in favor of the Second Amendment.
Thanks for the pointer; I called, and instead of pointing out how the tornado has constrained our choices, reversed than and said except for the six months of rebuilding our family had been shopping at store #59 since it first opened in the ’70s—a historic store for them, it was the first they leased that was really big and moved them to develop the Superstore—and that my hunting, shooting and fishing family would be “distressed” if they more than talked to Joe Biden. The lady I talked was very pleasant, said she’d forward my comments upwards, and had on her fingertips a defense, that they hadn’t changed their line of guns since the shooting….
Same defense I got from them.
Unfortunately, Sam is long dead and cold and Wal-Mart doesn’t have much in the way of principles any more, but if we call them enough, the threat of lost mammon may keep them steady.
Sad that that actually is a defense, that staying the course is a fairly strong one. They may know about Dick’s, but I’m sure they’ve got people wondering if they’ve stopped selling them because of policy vs. lack of inventory.
I think that’s what some people are wondering–I’ve even seen some blogs errantly lumping them in with Dick’s on that issue.
They need to quickly print up some pads with “Put your contact info here to get in line for an Evil Black Rifle when we can get more in stock!”; they probably stock few enough SKUs they could list/picture them and have you put a check mark by the model you want….
I just called and got the nicest woman. She said call volume was high on this issue (they appear to have brought in more people for it). Then she did something I did not expect: she thanked me for taking the time to call on the issue. She said so many people like to complain, but not many put their thoughts into words and take the steps required to make things happen. She said the corporate leadership were actively paying attention and that this is a “hot topic” within the company right now. And from her voice it was obvious she was the opposite of the middle-aged white guy stereotypical gun nut.
So I guess we should start calling right away: (479)273-4000
Ah, yes, the specific department you get is something like “Priority” Hotline or Problems or whatever; when I repeated “I’d like to express an opinion” I can well believe the young lady, probably black and Southern from the accent, changed to a different and much more welcome script of sorts.
And from her voice it was obvious she was the opposite of the middle-aged white guy stereotypical gun nut.
But to the extent they’re from the South, as mine probably was, there may be only so much difference. We are, over all, more tilted to the right, more often live in an environment where visibly being to the right is not a career death sentence, etc.
I went ahead and called, too. The guy I got sounded so young, it made me wonder if he was legal to work. I was nice, but firm that I was a longtime customer and very concerned about their involvement and they could lose my business for good, and his poor voice was shaky.
Bless his heart, he was probably nervous his first few calls.
Wait, did I put that? Damn.
Thanks for the info UTLaw
I just called. Got a nice woman who seemed familiar with the issue. Seemed a bit gobsmacked.
But hey, it can’t hurt to call.
Just tried to call, Customer Service closed at 5 PM central.
I just called again today and the guy I got didn’t read the company statement. Instead, he told me that he agreed wholeheartedly, that he hoped that Wal-Mart wouldn’t change their policies, and that he didn’t think they would because they had been getting an avalanche of calls today, and that it’s a landslide in our favor.
Keep up the good work people!