A Little Off the Top: In the eye of the Wal-Mart storm, part II

Probably the most frequently asked question I've had to field over the past several months is, "Where do you stand on the Wal-Mart issue?" It's been tough fielding that one, since inevitably, the person asking has a decidedly frank point of view on the matter.

Several Wal-Mart opponents would often stop by the office and ask me why I don't write an editorial against the supercenter, citing all the litany of corporate sins Wal-Mart is supposed to be guilty of.

"For the same reason I don't write an editorial talking about all the thousands of dollars they donate to the community each year, and how the supercenter would be an asset to people on fixed incomes," I would reply.

There are times when we can use this newspaper space to advocate things that would benefit the community, or highlight problems that need to be addressed, but I thought this was one issue that had plenty of people weighing in without me needing to throw my two cents in. It was great to see how many people emailed us or wrote letters to the editor on the subject.

This entire supercenter issue has proved once again there's always two sides to every story, and seeing how that issue has played out in the community has been interesting to say the least. For every one person who says Wal-Mart doesn't pay a decent wage and is responsible for outsourcing jobs and funding cheap labor overseas, there's a local family who tells me they drive to Missoula every two weeks, on payday, to save $80-150 on their grocery bill.

Opinions on the supercenter have been all over the map. One of the biggest challenges for me was trying to decide which Wal-Mart issues are relevant to Polson and Lake County, and which ones weren't.

Take the issue of decent wages and benefits, for example. Supercenter opponents cite studies saying that states around the country have had to cover underinsured Wal-Mart employees, causing larger health care costs for everyone else because Wal-Mart doesn't pay its share. I suppose this is happening somewhere in America, but this argument doesn't really apply to Polson, in my opinion.

If you make $10 an hour and get health insurance at a Wal-Mart in Fairfax, Virginia, where the average single family home costs more than half a million dollars, you are living at the poverty line, I'm sure. That same $10 with benefits in Polson, however, puts you somewhere above the poverty line. Of course, you aren't living the high life, but the irony is that the local Wal-Mart is one of the few employers that can afford to provide access to all kinds of benefits. This might be the norm in Denver, Baltimore or the Phoenix job market, but unfortunately, in Montana not a lot of families have access to health insurance, a 401(k) and other benefits that the local Wal-Mart offers.

Another argument I've heard is that a supercenter will hurt existing small businesses. This might be true for optometrists, and tire and lube places, since the new supercenter will feature those "add-on" facilities, but I think that if local businesses suffered any decline, they already did when the original store went in years ago.

One local tire dealership has received some flack for being quoted saying they weren't worried about a tire and lube place at the supercenter because they felt secure in their relationship with their existing customers. I applaud this gung-ho attitude and I think it's worth considering.

My own experience purchasing ammunition is a good example. When I want to go to the county shooting range, I drive past Wal-Mart and go straight to Ronan Sports and Western to get my box of shells. I do that because I can get better advice on what to buy, with a greater selection and a more knowledgeable staff, than whatever person happens to be behind the gun counter at Wal-Mart.

It's not that I don't get good service at Wal-Mart, it's just that they don't specialize in any one area. The guy unlocking the ammunition cabinet at Wal-Mart was stocking items in the automotive section a few minutes prior. In the times I've shopped at Wal-Mart, I've always gotten helpful service when I asked, but they don't pretend to be able to provide specialized service in any one area, and for this reason, I think smaller businesses can still compete.

For that same reasoning, you can buy windshield wiper fluid at Wal-Mart, but I'll order a new alternator at my local NAPA store, and they'll even lend me the tools to install it in the parking lot if I didn't bring my own.

Obviously, the businesses that will be hit hardest are Super 1 and Safeway, and probably to a greater extent, the smaller grocery stores in Pablo, Charlo and other locations throughout the county.

Moody's Market president Greg Hertz has taken some flack for his opposition to the supercenter, with people accusing him of having high prices due to a lack of competition. I don't know if that's true, but if I were in Greg's shoes I'd be doing the same thing — fighting for my business.

(In case you are wondering why you haven't heard anything from Safeway management, it's mainly because the local Safeway is corporate-owned. Although they will no doubt experience some financial pressure from the opening of a supercenter, this is an issue their corporate offices have already faced hundreds of times around the country.)

While individual employees at these grocery stores might have to be let go, or have their hours cut back because of a supercenter, hundreds of consumers in Lake County will benefit. That's a harsh reality that pains me to type, that a few honest, hardworking people will probably lose their jobs so many more can save a lot on their monthly grocery bill.

Does the livelihood of an elderly person on a fixed income or a single mom with three kids outweigh that of a grocery store employee who gave seven years of service to the company, and who will now have to be let go? That's a tough one to answer, because I'm not the elderly person, the single mom or the grocery clerk.

We'll be exploring these issues in more detail as construction begins and plans for the supercenter move forward. We'll be interviewing small business owners to see what changes, if any, they will be making to remain competitive, and we'll examine the impact of the supercenter once it's completed.

In the meantime, although the supercenter can now move forward, there's still plenty of issues to explore.

And for the many of you who have told me you are just plain sick of hearing about Wal-Mart, well, I can definitely relate to that, too.