Sam Walton
...right from his childhood. Sam Walton was not poor but did not have any disposable money lying around. Right from the beginning he learnt that children had to be contributors to the family. He started selling magazine subscriptions as young as seven years old which went on till his college days.
A lot of his attitude towards the value for money came from the time in which he had lived: The Great Depression. His dad was a very hard worker and did everything he could to raise his family in the best possible manner.
He did any kind of work that gave him money.
When Sam was ready to face the challenges of the world he came across the Robson family who inspired him a lot. He was very satisfied with the way the Robson’s handled their business. The business of the family was a partnership where all the children were also partners. This method Sam Walton applied with his family too which was the reason for the Walton family to hold around 38% of the Wal Mart shares even after it became a 50 billion dollar company.
Sam Walton never believed in a big showy lifestyle. He always had his hair cut from the barber shop, he drove a pickup truck. Whenever Sam went on a buying trip along with some of his associates they would stay in normal hotels and two persons to a room, they ate in normal family restaurants, this was all because they believed in the value of a dollar. They believed that every time they saved a dollar they went one step ahead of the competition and that is where they wanted to be.
Starting On A Dime
Sam Walton had been a very ambitious person right from the start. He always pursued everything he was interested in with a true passion, an obsession to win. He had been a class officer for several years. He became the youngest Eagle Scout in the history of the state of Missouri.
His first exposure to retailing had come in 1939 when his family...
View Full Essay
