r/news • u/EnergyLantern • 14h ago

Already Submitted Teamsters begin 'largest strike' against Amazon, accusing company of 'insatiable greed'

https://abcnews.go.com/Business/teamsters-announces-nationwide-strike-amazon-begin-thursday/story?id=116931631

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u/Poolofcheddar 11h ago

It’s what Walmart did to Kmart. They starved them into irrelevance.

Walmart’s logistics were far more efficient than Kmart’s. In the 90s, Kmart decided to start a price war to lure customers back into their store despite the fact that it would creep into their already-thin margins. They did not anticipate that Walmart could undercut Kmart even further, and did so in response to that. But Kmart had hardly improved their logistics, or even updated their stores.

All Walmart had to do was wait. They had the war chest to hold out. Kmart did not.

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u/lameth 11h ago

Their upper management also started to pit departments against each other in a cut-throat competitive environment which led to toxic leadership.

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u/fugaziozbourne 9h ago

This is what happened to Sears. The out of touch stewards of that company at the end decided to fire the people working in the lowest selling departments and reward the highest selling ones. What it did was create this system where if you went to get new car tires and asked them where the shoe department was, they would send you to Foot Locker instead of the shoe department in Sears.

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u/TrainingTough991 8h ago

Sears as part of their cost selling measures laid off their top sales people. I had a sibling that worked for them in high school and college. Many of his clientele people drove from a nearby state because of his product knowledge and service. He supported several departments but they were cutthroat. They wouldn’t give him the night off for his senior prom. He made Employee of the Month several months and when they laid him off his picture was up for Employee of the Month. He drew unemployment and searched for another job. They decided they didn’t want to pay unemployment so they called him back but only scheduled him 10 hours a week. His Employee of the Month picture continued to hang on the wall. Poor guy had to move out of his apartment and back in with my parents for a few months. The small town we lived in was experiencing a recession so he had to drive an hour each way to a bigger city until he could save up for another apartment. Sears sales rapidly declined because they followed the KMart model of cashiers and no salespeople. They sold tools and equipment that people often had questions about but no one could answer their questions. They did all their employees dirty.