Sam Walton

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Sam Walton (1936)

Samuel Moore "Sam" Walton (born March 29, 1918 in Kingfisher , Oklahoma , † April 5, 1992 in Little Rock ) was an American entrepreneur. He founded and ran the largest global US supermarket chain, Walmart .

personality

Sam Walton was, according to contemporaries who got to know him personally, an exceptionally down-to-earth, sociable and friendly person. As a billionaire, he flew to his branches with a Cessna propeller plane and surprised reporters who wanted to see the (temporarily) richest man in the world with his old pick-up . Although he wasn't particularly interested in politics, he provided financial support to Republican politicians.

Factory: Made in America

In 1992, Sam Walton published his autobiography in the book Sam Walton: Made in America . In this work he describes his personal success story. Some of his theses can be summarized as follows:

  1. Be customer-centric and persistent
  2. Be frugal and build the entire business on frugality
  3. Think in small things ("Retail is Detail", so "Retail is Detail")
  4. One step at a time ("Think one store at a time", which actually means "Think one store after the other", but can be translated as stated in general terms)
  5. Communicate, communicate, communicate
  6. Keep your ear to the ground
  7. Shift responsibility and authority down the leadership pyramid
  8. Make sure that good ideas come to the surface
  9. Keep the organization lean and fight bureaucracy

literature

  • George Packer: The settlement. An inner story of the new America. Fischer Taschenbuch, Frankfurt am Main 2015, ISBN 978-3-596-03025-5 , pp. 122–128.
  • Sam Walton, John Huey: Sam Walton. Made in America. My story. Doubleday, New York 1992. (American original edition)
  • Sam Walton, John Huey: Sam Walton. My story. The path to becoming the world's most successful retailer. Redline, Munich 2019, ISBN 978-3-86881-751-5 . (German edition with index)

Web links

  • [1] Sam Waltons Rules translated more extensively into German
  • [2] Biography (English)
  • [3] Fortune 500 list (English)
personal data
SURNAME Walton, Sam
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Walton, Samuel Moore (full name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION American entrepreneur
DATE OF BIRTH March 29, 1918
PLACE OF BIRTH Kingfisher , Oklahoma
DATE OF DEATH April 5, 1992
Place of death Little rock