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Wal-Mart Tries to Find Its Customer For all its succ

游客2023-07-30  22
问题                        Wal-Mart Tries to Find Its Customer
    For all its success in the United States--and there is plenty of it--Wal-Mart Stores is still struggling to figure out its performance at home, where sales growth at individual stores has dropped, its customers routinely flirt with rivals like Target for clothing and its advertising has often failed to inspire.
    The retailer’s plans to fix the problems became clearer yesterday, when Wal-Mart executives pledged to remodel (装饰) nearly half of its United States stores over the next 18 months, beef up its marketing division and expand a bold line of clothing across much of the chain.
    The changes, explained in Wal-Mart’s fourth-quarter earnings announcement yesterday, threw a spotlight on the increasingly important role of one man: Eduardo Castro-Wright, the new chief of Wal-Mart’s United States stores. Mr. Castro-Wright is a popular figure in the company because of his success in transforming the retailer’s Mexican division into one of its most profitable units.
    Mr. Castro-Wright, 51, has proved to be an aggressive innovator, overseeing a change in regional store management that will put more supervisors in the field rather than in the company’s hometown of Bentonville, Ark., and encouraging experimentation, like a new pharmacy station that brings customers closer to pharmacists.
    "Clearly, Wal-Mart’s fortunes over the next 12 to 18 months counts on the quality of the job that Eduardo Castro-Wright does," said Robert F. Buchanan, a retail analyst at A. G. Edwards ＆ Sons. "He is the man on the hot seat."
    Bill Dreher, a retail analyst at Deutsche Bank Securities, called Mr. Castro-Wright a rising star and a very strong candidate to succeed the chief executive, H. Lee Scott Jr., providing that he can fix what analysts say is broken in the United States--namely a shopping experience that Wal-Mart executives concede has become inconsistent and, at times, unpleasant because of cluttered aisles and outdated decoration.
    Sales at Wal-Mart stores open for at least a year grew, on average, 3.6 percent a month in fiscal(财政的)year 2005, compared with a 5.8 percent gain for Target, according to the International Council of Shopping Centers, a trade group.
    And as yesterday’s earnings--or perhaps more accurately, investors’ reactions--showed, managing Wal-Mart is no simple task. Profit rose 13 percent in the quarter, but Wal-Mart, the nation’s largest retailer, predicted that full-year earnings would fall below Wall Street’s expectations.
    As a result, Wal-Mart’s shares fell as much as 1.5 percent in morning trading. Shares closed down 36 cents, or less than 1 percent, at ＄45.74.
    Wal-Mart said it was optimistic about 2006 despite’ the financial burdens--among them higher energy prices--facing its predominantly working-class shoppers.
    The company forecast full-year earnings yesterday of ＄2.88 to ＄2.95 a share, compared with analysts’ estimates of ＄2.98. Wal-Mart pointed out that the Wall Street estimates did not reflect higher interest costs and share repurchases.
    Mr. Scott said the retailer finished strong in its fourth quarter, which ended Jan. 31. Net income rose to ＄3.6 billion, or 86 cents a share, for the quarter, from ＄3.2 billion, or 75 cents a share, a year ago. Sales increased 8.6 percent, to ＄89 billion from ＄82 billion, but overall revenue of ＄90.1 billion was below analysts’ estimates.
    In a conference call this morning, Mr. Castro-Wright outlined his plan to improve the uneven shopping experience at Wal-Mart’s American stores, which accounted for 67 percent of the company’s ＄312 billion in annual sales last year.
    Perhaps the most ambitious part of the plan is the proposed renovation of 1,800 stores over the next 18 months. The remodeling is intended to bring the chain’s oldest outlets in line with newer ones, which have faux hardwood floors in the clothing department, lower display cases that make it easier to see merchandise, and--as Wal-Mart like to emphasize--better restrooms.
    Bernard Sosnick, an analyst at Oppenheimer ＆ Company, called the pace of the remodeling remarkable, noting the company’s budget for capital expenditures, which he estimated at ＄17 billion, exceeded the annual sales at a rival, Kohl’s department store? But the store improvements may be coming too late for some customers, said Mr. Buchanan, the A. G. Edwards analyst. "Arguably, they have fallen behind. They have too many tired-looking stores," he said, adding that Mr. Castro-Wright is "barking up the right tree."
    A Wal-Mart representative said Mr. Castro-Wright was unavailable for an interview and declined to comment on his future at the company. Mr. Castro-Wright, who was born in Ecuador, held senior positions at RJR Nabisco and Honeywell Transportation before he began running Wal-Mart Mexico in 2001.
    To appeal to fashion-conscious shoppers, Mr. Castro-Wright said during the conference call that a line of clothing called Metro7, originally introduced to 500 stores, will be stocked at 1,500 stores by September. The line, which includes distressed-denim jeans and silk camisoles with sequined lace, has exceeded sales expectations.
    Wal-Mart has found that its higher-income consumers rely on the chain for cheap consumables like laundry detergent and toilet paper, but shop elsewhere for fashion, home decor (装饰) and electronics, products that typically deliver higher profit margins for retailers.
    Wal-Mart refers to such consumers as "selective shoppers," because they can afford to buy a skirt, television or comforter at higher-priced retailer.
    To reach them, the company has expanded its marketing team, poaching senior executives from Frito-Lay and DaimlerChrysler. It is introducing more sophisticated advertisements, largely supplanting the sword-wielding, price-slashing smiley face, which seemed dated next to sleek ads from Target.
    The latest television and print media campaign, in a departure from Wal-Mart tradition, concedes that shoppers do not think of the chain as a destination for fashion. In one print ad, a woman arrives at a store looking for eyedrops and, to her surprise, discovers smart apparel. Instead of advertising "always low prices," it ends by encouraging consumers to "look beyond the basics."  [br] Wal-Mart is optimistic about 2006 despite______.
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答案 the financial burdens
解析 根据第十段第一行。
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