According to the mini case Walmart from the textbook,

Give me a 2 page paper telling me why Walmart has a Strategic Advantage.

(Submissions will be two pages long, single-spaced, Times New Roman in 12 pt. font using MLA format.)

Helpful questions for your paper…

Why has Walmart been successful?

What is the single most important factor that has contributed to Wal-Mart’s phenomenal success?

Why exactly are Wal-Mart’s costs lower than its competitors?

Examine each element of the cost structure (e.g., COGS, labor, rent, advertising, distribution, technology, etc. as a percentage of total sales) and assess where Wal-Mart’s costs are lower than competitors—and why.

Why can’t Wal-Mart’s competitors imitate Wal-Mart and realize similarly high profits? If you were running Target what would you do differently? What, if anything, from Wal-Mart would you want to imitate?

Why do you think Wal-Mart has had difficulty succeeding in foreign markets, especially in emerging markets like Brazil, Canada, China, India, Germany and South Korea?

What should Walmart do to respond to the emerging trend of online purchases, and more specifically to the threat of Amazon.com as the dominant online retailer?

Mini-Case Grading:

What I’m looking for:

Demonstrate that you understand chapter concepts and can make logical connections between the chapter concepts and the case study. The book alone should have enough information between the case study and chapters to write a thought out and complete answer. Cite the page number you’re pulling information from. The questions on the lecture slides are helpful guiding questions and I recommend starting there. You may add other related findings/connections.

Answer preview

Strategic management is essential to all companies that aim at surviving the internal and external threats against their competitors. Among the leading companies in the United States (US) that has shown exemplary efforts in strategic management is Walmart. The firm is the leading retailer in the US, with revenues of over USD450 million as of 2015 (Michelson, Boucher, Cheng, Huang & Jia, 2018). The company’s unique strategy has made it a market leader against all its competitors. Walmart has…