[taneem]

Stories like this are often instigated by someone inside the organization with an agenda. They reach out to a journalist, give some quotes anonymously, and put them in touch with others in the company that are allies and will also give supporting quotes.

This article feels like an article designed to pressure Marc Lore to leave.

Losing $1B on $22B in revenue, after just 3 years of really starting this bet is nothing!

[drevil-v2]

And I have also noticed Vox publications in particular often push their singular narrative again and again and again regardless of merit or truth.

Makes me think Marc Lore has run afoul of and/or transgressed some ideological prime directive and this is a hit job.

[heymijo]

> One other factor to keep in mind, though it’s unclear if it contributes to the Foran-Lore tension: In past years, Foran’s annual performance bonus has been heavily tied to the operating profit of Walmart’s US business, which includes the e-commerce division that Lore runs. Walmart’s US operating profit hasn’t, however, factored into Lore’s annual bonus.

Lore is operating like a startup, not focused on short-term profits.

Meanwhile, Walmart's US CEO, Greg Foran has his compensation tied to annual results, which include Lore's operations.

If accurate, this reads like Incentives 101, and it reflects poorly on Doug McMillon, Walmart's overall CEO.

[kjaftaedi]

Maybe it's my limited experience, but it always seemed to me that the people that shop at walmart genuinely enjoy the idea of shopping at walmart (going to the physical store to get a good deal on a product) and aren't the type to buy walmart products online.

Their products aren't even that good, surely more of them aren't going to hold up to online competition either.

I also never got the feeling that walmart shoppers are "i need same day delivery" types. they're in it for the bargains. You tell them an option is going to be slightly cheaper, they'll go for it.

I feel like they should keep the focus on their brick and mortar stores and forget about trying to compete with amazon.

[hkmurakami]

I now trust Walmart more than Amazon for brand name goods that are easily counterfeited since they don't mingle inventory. Never thought I'd say that.

[fkdo]

Walmart has been known to put pressure on brands to reduce the cost of their products. Sometimes they can find the cost savings in the economy of scale of doing business with Walmart. Sometimes they find cost savings by making a cheaper product.

Buying something from Wal-Mart is far from a seal of quality.

[HeWhoLurksLate]

Same! I received a 20,000 mAh store-brand battery from WalMart a while back, and it works really well, was a good value, and can run a Pi forever. Same goes for the HDMI -> RCA adapter of theirs that I literally asked my mom to get (she's not technical, and managed to get exactly what I needed, which is great!)

Yay, WalMart! (And Best Buy, for that matter- their online pick-it-up-in-five-minutes option is amazing.)

[Xunxi]

That's an outdated stereotype. I think they're really moving in the right direction.

Their deliveries are on point, the self checkout works perfectly, they're even a store pick up service where you just pull up to designated parking stops and the attendants load up your trunk with order which is ready by time you arrive at the shop.

It's a lot harder to get your product on a Walmart shelf than having it listed on Amazon. There's an existential quality assurance when you buy from Walmart than Amazon.

[jimmaswell]

I always felt like people go to wal mart just because it has everything and it's cheap. And their products have always been fine for me. Recently bought a ton of stuff there for my first bike and no complaints.

[kortilla]

Nope. I shop at Walmart and hate the experience of going to the store. I just hate it less than the counterfeit products on amazon or getting ripped off elsewhere.

[JustSomeNobody]

Wait, there’s a type of person who shops at Walmart?

[elchief]

Didn't amazon lose billions for years?

[adventured]

Amazon's early operating losses by year:

1996: -$6.4m on $15.7m sales || 1997: -$32m on $147m sales || 1998: -$109m on $609m sales || 1999: -$605m on $1.63b sales || 2000: -$863m on $2.76b sales || 2001: -$412m on $3.12b sales

In 2002, as a forced result of the dotcom crash and stock market plunge (their ability to continue to fund such red ink was in question), they had to expedite getting to operating break-even and turned off the spending spree they were using to get big artificially fast. They turned a $64m operating profit in 2002 on $3.9b in sales. Positive operating income climbed to $440m by 2004.

[username444]

Not really. They were profitable, they just invested heavily in infrastructure (warehouses) and developing new services (AWS).

They may have been unattractive by wall street's standards (eg. Pay outs) but they were far from unprofitable.

[300bps]

Not really. They were profitable, they just invested heavily in infrastructure (warehouses) and developing new services (AWS).

Amazon lost about $2 billion in their first six years of operations.

And Walmart's online presence would be profitable now if they weren't investing heavily in infrastructure (20 fulfillment centers trying to catch up to Amazon's 110) and new services (online catalog to match Amazon's).

[simonebrunozzi]

That's a really big claim. No, technically they were not profitable for several years. Then, in the last 10-12 years, you are right that they invested heavily in R&D and everyone knows that one story.