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By Newsweek Editors
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Wal-Mart's script for success is predictable: the retailer descends on an unsuspecting town, threatening to sweep Main Street of mom-and-pop hardware stores and Kozy Korner shops. A long, expensive and emotional battle ensues. In the end, the company's deep pockets and the lure of cut-rate laundry detergent and DVDs is just too great.
But the Arkansas retailer got a reminder last week that in Hollywood endings, the underdog always wins. Voters in the city of Inglewood, a mostly African-American and Hispanic suburb in the flight path of LAX, blocked attempts to bring the first of its "supercenters" to Los Angeles County. "Without question, it's a chink in Wal-Mart's armor," says Harley Shaiken, a Berkeley labor professor.
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Will there be a string of sequels, as Wal-Mart proceeds with plans to erect nearly 40 other retailing-and-grocery meccas in the Golden State? Labor groups are already planning to thwart the anti-union retailer. "There's talk of building Wal-Marts in two other places in L.A. County," says Miguel Contreras, of the local AFL-CIO. "We're already on the ground there." A big reason for Wal-Mart's defeat was ill will over a recent supermarket strike regarding cuts in health-care benefits, which the chains' owners said were necessary to compete with Wal-Mart.
The big-box retailer says it will push forward. "We view this as sort of an anomaly, and there's not necessarily something to learn here," says Wal-Mart spokesman Bob McAdam. But the Rev. Jesse Jackson, who helped oppose Wal-Mart in Inglewood, says this is a wake-up call. "People are beginning to accept that Wal-Mart represents short-term pleasure and long-term pain," he says. Maybe, but the temptation of low prices can be hard to resist.
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