Well, another reason to skip Wal-Mart

I have three Wal Marts within about 8 miles of my house and all I see is that they have done but good for the areas.

The one nearest my house (2.5 miles) was nothing but a corn field with nothing around. Since they moved in 4 small plazas with mom and pop business have opened and the area is thriving. The only down side is the traffic getting through the area. This store also hosts the largest cruise night in the area with 600-700 cars on a Friday night and give $10-$20,000 a year raised from running a food concession to the car club that runs it for their Charity.

The next closest one took over an abandoned store in a Mall that had just about closed from lack of tenants and has brought that Mall back to the point it is one of the biggest in the area. The last time I was there I don't think there was any empty store fronts.

The third is a Super Store that was built in an abandoned sand pit and since it opened a whole new plaza of small specialty stores and restaurants have moved in. This store puts on a car show every year and is now hosting a cruise night on Saturdays.

All three of the stores support local scouts, sporting teams and church groups by allowing them to hold car washes (and not charging for the water) and to sell cookies & candy at the entrances.

Target has started opening stores near these Wal Marts to give people another choice. Wal Mart may have buried other chain stores like K Mart, Ames, Caldor, Bradlees in my area but that was simply because Wal Mart has what you want at a great price and these other stores never did. I have not seen any evidence that they have driven out small business, quite the opposite.

I consider myself an informed consumer and gladly go to Wal Mart for some things and won't for others. They may be the worlds largest but they still only have 2% of the total retail business world wide so there is plenty of room for everyone else to compete.