Wal-Mart, The Bank ?

By 2010, consumers could possibly open Wal-Mart accounts, visit Wal-Mart dentists, rent Wal-Mart car.

NEW YORK (CNN/Money) - It's already the king of retail. Give it another five years and Wal-Mart may well be on its way to conquering other valuable little nuggets of the business world.

For instance, why shouldn't the world's largest retailer open its own Wal-Mart banks? The opportunity is clearly there given that 20 percent of Wal-Mart shoppers currently don't have their own bank accounts, according to market research firm Retail Forward.

"Wal-Mart is already testing the waters," Sandy Skrovan, Retail Forward's vice president and retail analyst, said in an audio forum Wednesday titled "Wal-Mart: How Big? How Far? How Fast?"

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Aside from banking, she lists travel services, healthcare, fuel refinery and publishing as a few of the most appealing areas of non-traditional growth for the retailer.

"Wal-Mart already offers travel packages to consumers. It's testing car rental service in a few stores. In 2010, maybe consumers could even fly the friendly skies with Wal-Mart," Skrovan said.

Wal-Mart is already the fourth largest pharmacy in the country. It's not implausible or inconceivable that Wal-Mart would expand healthcare services to offer its customers in-store eye checks for prescription eyewear and contact lenses and even dental care.


hmmm a step closer to NWO ? Think about it like this.. NWO takes over, they run Wallyworld and that is the only store around !

It could happen.

Well, I don't know about NWO and Wal-Mart, but I thought that they already had in-store eye checks and eyewear/contact lenses. All the Wal-Marts I've been to have them. Targets also, for that matter.

yes they do have them, Wal-Mart is where I got my glasses.

best prices I could find.

Originally posted by elevatedone
"Wal-Mart already offers travel packages to consumers. It's testing car rental service in a few stores. In 2010, maybe consumers could even fly the friendly skies with Wal-Mart," Skrovan said.

Wal-Mart is already the fourth largest pharmacy in the country. It's not implausible or inconceivable that Wal-Mart would expand healthcare services to offer its customers in-store eye checks for prescription eyewear and contact lenses and even dental care.

The car rental services and travel packages are not Wal-mart owned, they lease space in their stores to travel agents and independent car rental companies.

As for being the fourth largest pharmacy that is also misleading; some of those are also leased space that are owned an operated by independent pharmacies.

The same goes for their photo, eye care, jewlery and phone services located in their stores. You can tell which are indepdents real easy, they are the ones who ask for payment at their counter.

Does "Victory" name brand mean anything to anyone?

Don’t know if you know this or not, but they are also one of the biggest pushers of the RFID, and a test site for RFID applications.

Wal-Mart already is in the banking business, Its called Arvest Banks. I know cause my check is directly deposited there every thursday morning.

The pharmacies are another story. Since they own so many pharmacies when they open a new one they run it at a loss, the prices are so low they get all the customers in town and then, after they have put the other pharmacies out of business they jack their prices thru the roof.

My ISP is Wal-Mart. My bank is Wal-mart. I buy my groceries at Wal-Mart. I got my last pair of glasses at Wal-Mart. I have two daughters that work at Wal-Mart. I live two blocks from the Walton Arts center, Bud Walton arena and just about anything else you want to call Wallyworld.

To be fair Wal-Mart was started in this little corner of Arkansas so they bought it. All of it.

It's only a matter of time before they buy your town too.

Love and light,

Wupy

While they have the best prices on many items,
they grow like kudsu vines, choking off the other plant life nearby.

And wal-marts goody goody nature i find to be devicive and exclusionary....they wont carry some records because of lyrics...ok daddy thank you for denying me the chance to buy something for my protection from things corpro-daddy thinks is bad for me.

Sure, they have the right to do business as they choose
and i have the right (untill they swallow everything) to avoid them like the plauge they are.

Originally posted by elevatedone
yes they do have them, Wal-Mart is where I got my glasses.

best prices I could find.

When they get the monoply i.e get rid of the Small Business they then start putting prices up again because they have no competion. We got to support Small Business, i believe there more dedicated to there job and customers and more responsible and a better work ethic. Most people in Small Business care Wally-Mart got your money pizz off.

I sometimes try to support small businesses..

however, when I'm facing over $400 for a glasses compared to $275, sorry, I have to take the $125 savings and run...