‘Raiders Of The Lost Walmart’ Expose Retail Discounting Sins

Everybody likes to talk about the addiction that brick-and-mortar retailers have developed for deep, and often destabilizing, discounts, and they usually point to store closings and executive board shakeups at Macy’s and other chains as clear proof of these practices’ consequences. But what if the truly ugly face of in-store retail’s discounting dependency could be found on the shelves of one of America’s largest brands?

That’s exactly what the “Raiders Of The Lost Walmart” have been documenting for years. By engaging in some heart-pounding retail archaeology, the adventurous “raiders” find pieces of archaic technology, electronic accessories or obsolete video games and consoles still inexplicably carried by Walmart and often discounted (or not) to laughably impossible degrees. Consumerist catalogs the results of each raider’s retail excavations, the most recent of which include a silicone rubber case for a Sony Walkman MP3 Player from 2007 (“WAS: $19.88. NOW: $3.00”) and an eight-year-old version of a Garmin Nuvi 260 GPS (“WAS: $268.88. NOW: $150.00”).

Not all of the discounting follies involve desperate attempts at making a sale on old inventory, though. For example, Walmart advertises this Philips iPhone 3G docking and speaker system at a cool $99.99, despite the fact that connection hardware changes made by Apple to all phones onward from the iPhone 5 in 2012 obfuscates any attempt to connect a modern iPhone model. Still, the label indicates that the $99.99 price on this particular model was set in 2015, so Walmart must see some value left in the relic of a retail and consumer electronics age gone by.

On the serious side of things, it’s at least, to some degree, understandable that a retailer as large and as split between in-store and eCommerce operations has trouble keeping track of the products at the end of the long tail of its inventory chain. However, the fact that these items are somehow still registered within inventory management systems (per the recent price adjustments) and that they’re taking up shelf space that could be used for products customers actually want has to indicate some level of forethought to these electronic antiquities.

Trying to hawk old products under discounted prices isn’t going to be the cause of Walmart’s downfall, but it’s an indication of just how far retail has gone down the rabbit hole of reflex price reductions — when in doubt, knock a few dollars off. Most of all, it seems almost troublingly automatic that these products would be put back up for sale. Even as industry standbys like Macy’s struggle to contain the discounting-inflicted revenue freefall it’s embroiled in, Robin Report CEO Robin Lewis opined in late 2015 whether retail had already gotten itself stuck in an unstoppable downward spiral with unregulated discounts. Calling the problem an “economic black hole,” Lewis warned that when retailers like Walmart keep obsolete technology on their shelves, regardless of what haphazard discounts are applied to them, consumer opinion is what they most lose out on.

“The great ‘value strategy’ charade is that retailers actually believe discounting to be a whole new market for them,” Lewis explained. “What they are really succumbing to is a competition for cheap, cheaper and cheapest, when they should be pursuing good, better and best.”

Lest online retailers get all high and mighty over their brick-and-mortar brethren, evidence is emerging that the same addictive drive for deals inculcated in consumers by in-store merchants desperate for sales has infected online shopping behaviors, too. Larry Compeau, professor of consumer studies at Clarkson University, told The New York Times that, because online retailers have actually cultivated an atmosphere of deal-seeking and bargain hunting even greater than that of B&M, shoppers have come to expect the same caliber of deals but with smaller and smaller margins. Even large retailers, like Amazon and Overstock, can lapse into some ethically questionable pricing territory.

“Everyone expects a deal on the Web,” Compeau said. “Nobody wants to pay retail. Some sellers are now willing to deceive consumers to make the sale.”

Could it be only a matter of time before the Raiders Of The Lost Walmart have some help from acolytes of the Temple Of Doomed Online Retailers?