Wednesday, November 09, 2005

Last day in Arkansas

Posted by Dawn at Wednesday, November 09, 2005
In the morning, after packing our bags, putting them in the car and having our breakfast, we went to downtown Bentonville. It is just a small downtown but nice as the surroundings quite beautiful-nice flowers and trees. Spotted a huge lettuce looking vegetable grown...


They have a nice park in the center of the town,just in front of the courthouse. The park is small but like I said, it has nice trees. Think it is nicer at this time of the year cos it is autumn.





So happened when we were taking pictures in the park, we spotted a criminal going up to the courthouse and it was dressed in its traditional convict uniform- black striped pullover.


Anyway, our purpose for going downtown was to go to Walmart museum. Bentonville is home to Walmart and so, its head office is right here in this humble town.

Sam Walton, the founder of Walmart started off selling things in this 5-10 store. 5-10 means 5 cent, 10 cent store. So, Walmart actually came from very humble beginnings and how their profit grew from about US$50,000 a year to billions now. I am a big fan of Walmart now that I am in US because there is practically anything and everything you can get in Walmart. Not only that...but prices are cheaper than other stores. So, there is really no point in going other grocery stores to get your stuff if you can get everything from Walmart at low prices.

The groceries are also fresh and they have everything from fresh produce, to cooked food, to bicycles, paint work, car oil, car repair shop, florist, optician, developing photo, hairdresser, home an decor stuff, clothes, nursery (selling plants), etc...

How I wish Singapore has something like that..hmm..anyone interested to start one? :) The closest to Walmart is probably Carrefour or Giant..but still, it is far off as compared..

So, in this shop, they have old collections of pictures of how Walmart grew...what it looked like in the past and the strategies and principles that Sam Walton stuck by which got him successful. He even started Walmart aviation- having own planes to transport goods and do business quickly. Amazing.






After touring (for free), I bought the book that he wrote as I felt that there must be something I can learn from this guy. Very interesting book-highly recommended for someone who wants to be an entrepreneur or just someone who simply like to learn from others.. :)

Our flight was in the afternoon, so we went to "Sonics" Drive-In where you just park your car and order from the intercom, then they would send your food out. It is for Americans to just eat in the car and drive off without stepping out of the car.

Anyway, we da bao and brought it to the airport to eat. It is a new airport with not many shops. Looks new, but empty. Everyone was staring at us when we took out our coney dogs, hamburger and fries to eat as there was only one cafe opened in the airport selling usual cold sandwiches and drinks. Haha..Think they were all envious.

I could not wait to go back Singapore as I would be giving my mum a surprise birthday party and visit! :)

Stopped over at LA for few hours. Had dinner and just stoned for a couple of hours. Watched the sun set from where we had our dinner..very beautiful.





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