Does Walmart sell Inferior Products

Aaleel

Aaleel

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Aaleel
The reason why I ask. I know someone that used to work at Walmart and they told me once that Walmart had it's own manufacturer that made products just for them and they weren't as good as others. I didn't think twice about until recently, two things happened,

1) We bought my Great Grandmother a LCD TV for the switch because after all these years she still won't get cable lol. But the TV didn't have all the inputs or features listed on the box, and the picture of the inputs on the back didn't match the picture in the manual.

We went to Best Buy, same TV, same box, same model number, looked at the floor display, and it had everything it was supposed to have.

2) Went to buy a new computer desk for my daughter. Walmart had a desk I liked but the reviews averaged 3 stars out of 5. People complaining of missing screws, holes that were supposed to pre-drilled were not drilled. Parts where the black was not finished and they had to take a permanent maker to it. Missing directions etc.

Once again looked at Office Max and Best Buy both had the same desk, 5 out of 5 stars on Best Buy, no one with similar problems. No reviews at Office Max.

So now I have to wonder lol.

Has anyone else ever had cases like this, just wondering?
 
I'm going to be a bit discreet about this.. but.. according to a VERY reliable source, yes Wal-Mart does have a company (in a manner of speaking) that makes products for them. It's more like they purchase uber-cheap products manufactured by Chinese companies that develop shoddy knock-off products that are low-quality and low-price.
Also, watch for products that appear to be re-taped and/or have the shipping label off to the side and not on the packing tape. It tends to mean that the product was a return - which in turns means that there's a good chance that it was already used before. Yes, Wal-Mart does tape back up products that are brought back and are still in decent condition (i.e. not scratched to hell or broken, etc) then resell them at the same price as before. If any product is obviously repackaged, don't buy it. Even if it means it's the last one, don't buy it. I'd recommend going elsewhere - such as Kmart, Target, or some other store.
When purchasing clothing from Wal-Mart, I also highly recommend that you WASH THE CLOTHES BEFORE WEARING THEM - this includes trying them on! Which means, yes, you will have to purchase them first. But I assure you, things will be much better off for you. But hey, just remember to keep all the tags just in case, and don't tell them it was washed (and by all means, please wash it correctly so it doesn't look like it was washed). I say this because people do return clothing, and sometimes it is put right back up onto the racks - so long as it still looks decent and intact.
Oh.. and when purchasing the furniture products, if it says it's oak, it's most likely an oak-covering on it.. if you look hard enough, you'll still find that at least 95% of the wooden furniture products sold there are still made out of the fiberwood / hardboard / particle board. Sure, it's got that nice oak-covering, but if you want actual quality 100% real wood products, you'll need to go to a wood worker's shop. (Also, this furniture thing applies to places like Menard's and even some desk stores, etc etc.)
All in all, that's all I can say for now. ;D
 
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Elixer said:
Also, watch for products that appear to be re-taped and/or have the shipping label off to the side and not on the packing tape. It tends to mean that the product was a return - which in turns means that there's a good chance that it was already used before. Yes, Wal-Mart does tape back up products that are brought back and are still in decent condition (i.e. not scratched to hell or broken, etc) then resell them at the same price as before. If any product is obviously repackaged, don't buy it. Even if it means it's the last one, don't buy it. I'd recommend going elsewhere - such as Kmart, Target, or some other store.
Click to expand...

Almost every department store does this with returns. Look around, many even charge you a restocking fee if you return a product for a refund or on exchanges without receipts. Possibly even for Exchanges with receipts as well if the company is dickish enough.
 
For big box electronics, TVs, Cameras, game systems etc, do a serial inquiry with the manufacturer (customer support will do just fine). They will let you know if the product is legit, refurb or a knock off.

As far as desks, you probably just got a returned item.

What's the deal on that?... what Skaw said up there.

And the washing clothes thing, I recommend washing your clothes or any cloth type merchandise you get anywhere lol.

Even with furniture... wipe it down with a disinfectant before perm use >_>.
 
Walmart. My favorite store! lol

Can't you just return it for a new one?

Most Walmarts take back anything I have a problem with.

As far as the reviews go, if its the walmart site vs office max. You also need to consider the millions of walmart customers vs whatever few officemax customers there are.

Also the quality of customers............ Not saying the quality of customer at Walmart is lower.... but they are the type to complain more.
 
I don't know about their other products, but I know that their food product standards are quite high under their Great Value label. You are getting the SAME (if not slightly better) product than the name brands because their standard is so high.
 
In the UK the quality of Wal-Mart customers (Asda in UK) are normally pikeys/chavs (wiggas especially)/++++s/blacks (pikey/chav/thug/++++ equivalent)/asians (indian equivalent, the peaceful nice types/most other times a thug wannabe or asian tough boyz, or homeboyz, or AZNZ (asians, thug/cool term for them, note: it's a fucking stupid term)) and then there's the poor old innocent family with about 10 kids.

http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=pikey incase no one knew what they were.

With the exception of the asian nice type category up there the rest of them are likely to steal/be a ++++ in general at the store or cause general nuisance enough to warrant a shot in the head (with a shotgun, no less) for their pathetic existence of human life.

The worst situation is when all of the above form a group and come into an Asda, normally with ipods + speakers + 3-4 mobile phones on speaker phone mode + rap + general annoying music. Sometimes they arrive as a convoy with a rude black kid in the middle somehow being the "boss".

Asda is usually cheaper in price (and quality from what I noticed) so it attracts the categories I mentioned above.

So yeh, in general, anywhere with an Asdas in the UK is likely to be infested by said groups of people. And they will bitch. Dearly.
Ask Gerry if you don't believe me.
 
Well as for the desk I never bought it, i just read reviews. But to me knicks and scratches could happen for a number of reasons, returned, shipping, etc.

But when you start taking pre-drilled holes not being there, that's all manufacturing. And to me that's something any person would complain about because it means you go from easy assembly with a hammer & screwdriver, to having to pull out your own power drill and do actual work to put the desk together. And for many people to have said this one place, and none at another just seems strange.

As for the TV. That was the one that bothered me the most. If it has the right model number and doesn't have all the features listed, and the TV out the box doesn't even match the picture on the box, or in the manual, that's a big problem to me, especially when you go to the next store and their TV's have everything.
 
Elixer said:
I'm going to be a bit discreet about this.. but.. according to a VERY reliable source, yes Wal-Mart does have a company (in a manner of speaking) that makes products for them. It's more like they purchase uber-cheap products manufactured by Chinese companies that develop shoddy knock-off products that are low-quality and low-price.
Also, watch for products that appear to be re-taped and/or have the shipping label off to the side and not on the packing tape. It tends to mean that the product was a return - which in turns means that there's a good chance that it was already used before. Yes, Wal-Mart does tape back up products that are brought back and are still in decent condition (i.e. not scratched to hell or broken, etc) then resell them at the same price as before. If any product is obviously repackaged, don't buy it. Even if it means it's the last one, don't buy it. I'd recommend going elsewhere - such as Kmart, Target, or some other store.
When purchasing clothing from Wal-Mart, I also highly recommend that you WASH THE CLOTHES BEFORE WEARING THEM - this includes trying them on! Which means, yes, you will have to purchase them first. But I assure you, things will be much better off for you. But hey, just remember to keep all the tags just in case, and don't tell them it was washed (and by all means, please wash it correctly so it doesn't look like it was washed). I say this because people do return clothing, and sometimes it is put right back up onto the racks - so long as it still looks decent and intact.
Oh.. and when purchasing the furniture products, if it says it's oak, it's most likely an oak-covering on it.. if you look hard enough, you'll still find that at least 95% of the wooden furniture products sold there are still made out of the fiberwood / hardboard / particle board. Sure, it's got that nice oak-covering, but if you want actual quality 100% real wood products, you'll need to go to a wood worker's shop. (Also, this furniture thing applies to places like Menard's and even some desk stores, etc etc.)
All in all, that's all I can say for now. ;D
Click to expand...

Almost all stores allow returns, and there's nothing strange about that. As long as the product itself is in original condition and unused, it is perfectly fine to buy it. They won't let you return it if you've used it, because you can't resell it at the original price then. There's several reasons people buy things and return them, including buyer's remorse.

As for clothes, unless the store itself, it is extremely easy to see when something is

a) used
b) washed

even if you try to hide it. Can you tell me you you can wash something and make it smell unwashed and unused? I'd be extremely surprised if you can, because I've yet to meet a customer that can fool me.

Besides, if you wash the clothes, the store can refuse a refund on it because it isn't in its original condition. and they have all right to refuse you, because refunds isn't something written in law (unless you buy over Internet, but again, unused condition), but something the store itself offers you as a customer.

I would never recommend someone to wash clothes before they try them on, because that means you might lose any chance to get a refund you might have had, as the store has all right to refuse a refund if the clothes wouldn't fit. While they do have all right to refuse you even before, your chance drastically reduce if you've washed the clothes.
 
I work for a company that makes coir fiber doormats and Walmart is one of our biggest sellers. I can't speak for the rest of the store but I know that our mats are high quality. Target doesn't sell our stuff anymore because they go for the cheaper Indian made mats instead. Walmart does sell some Indian mats but thankfully they sell ours too.

I've had little problem with Walmart products myself. I haven't bought a TV from them in a long time (like 7+ years) but the DVDs, clothes, yarn, food, toys, and medicine that I have bought from them has done as expected for me. The only defective thing that I remember buying was a wireless keyboard for the PS3 that didn't work correctly with FFXI. It was a manufacturing problem and not just the keyboard so I exchanged it for one that was compatible.

I admit that if I'm going to buy a computer desk or furniture I don't go to Walmart for that. I prefer to go to an actual furniture store so I can find something a bit sturdier. I have bought desks from them before and had the correct number of pieces in the box but later on I wanted something actually made of wood.
 
As far as wood products go. Right off the bat if you seem to be getting a huge deal with a "solid" wood piece it's probably bogus. No furniture maker would sell a solid wood piece at a rate that would allow these companies a high profit margin on low end user pricing. For instance, 1 solid wood chair (say dinner table chair) should fetch at LEAST $70. Can't really use MDF or fibre board with laminate for chairs. Desks, Wall units of course depending on size, in a SOLID wood, like pine.. you're looking at a good $300 average, and that's extremely cheap wood.

It's quite easy to figure out the quality of products by tapping on them alone, the pricing should be a dead give away though. Extremely cheap products manufactured by an out sourced company allows for low costs, which means low end user pricing.. thus high enough profit margins.
 
I will say this: Being in the Audio/Video business myself, I know for a fact that there are a lot of good A/V manufacturers out there selling the crappiest quality product to Wal-Mart under a different business name. You do not want Grandma putting that TV wall-mount on her wall (it snaps), you do not want anyone buying those speakers (they'll explode) and if you buy that DVD player... just return the damn thing.
 
Morwen said:
I will say this: Being in the Audio/Video business myself, I know for a fact that there are a lot of good A/V manufacturers out there selling the crappiest quality product to Wal-Mart under a different business name. You do not want Grandma putting that TV wall-mount on her wall (it snaps), you do not want anyone buying those speakers (they'll explode) and if you buy that DVD player... just return the damn thing.
Click to expand...

This is what happens. Manufacturers lower their standards on a few key items in order to keep their stock selling at Wal Mart. Many times they don't change the name on the product. You see the good brand you're used to, buy it, and go home with an inferior product. This is just one of a hundred reasons to shop somewhere else.
 
Cerato said:
This is what happens. Manufacturers lower their standards on a few key items in order to keep their stock selling at Wal Mart. Many times they don't change the name on the product. You see the good brand you're used to, buy it, and go home with an inferior product. This is just one of a hundred reasons to shop somewhere else.
Click to expand...

No, Sony actually sucks. Even the high-end product is shit.
 
Morwen said:
No, Sony actually sucks. Even the high-end product is shit.
Click to expand...

The (fucking ++++s) AZNZ in UK will like to disagree with you.

I'm not AZN either.





The story goes when I was working in a hospital and all these AZN DOCTORS had Sony shit. I said Sony wasn't that good and FUCK ME THEY GOT PISSED OFF.

lolaznz (lolasians)

That's a term I've been using for a while, thanks to the "loldrg" mentality back then. Hahahahaha.
 
Morwen said:
No, Sony actually sucks. Even the high-end product is shit.
Click to expand...

The only good Sony Product I ever had, no lie:

Spoiler:
DSCF1060.jpg


I may still have it laying about somewhere.
 
I don't mind Sony. I like Playstation and PSP, and the only other Sony product I've had was a TV we bought when I was like 5, and it still works perfectly.

What are you guys buying that work so horridly from Sony? Granted, I don't buy everything they release and only buy shit I actually need, but I've never experienced Sony having bad stuff. Then again, my experience with Sony is limited, but yeah.
 
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