One man built an empire with a single goal in mind…
Do what’s best for the customer.
Meet Mr. Sam.
Mr. Sam, Roy and his beat-up Ford F-150 pickup truck.
In 1962, Sam Walton opened his first store in Rogers, Arkansas — Wal-Mart Discount City.
To cut down signage costs, he shortened the name to Walmart.
And he was obsessed with customers.
In 1989, when Walmart “only” had 1,300 stores, Mr. Sam wrote a memo to his associates about his strategy:
More and more, I’m convinced exceeding our customers’ expectations must be our strategy.
Our Company’s future survival, in my opinion, depends on our always exceeding our customer’s expectations.
Our total objective should be to serve our customers every time they are in our store…
He laid out a seven-part “do it right the first time” approach. You can read the whole letter he wrote here.
It was a far cry from when he opened his first store.
That year the store generated around $13 million in sales.
By 1989, Walmart generated $20 billion in revenue.
And today, there are close to 11,000 retail stores around the world, generating more than $40 million in profits every day!
Mr. Sam knew the secret to business…
It’s the same thing Jeff Bezos, founder of Amazon, learned early on…
What’s good for customers is good for shareholders.
And boy, was that the understatement of the century!
When Walmart went public in 1970, shares were $16.50.
Since then, Walmart stock has split 11 times, each split was 2-for-1.
That means a person who bought 100 shares for $1,650 in 1970 would, 43 years later, have 204,800 shares, worth about $32 million … a return of 1,993,000%.
Simple Things
Mr. Sam created a “perpetual customer engine” where people just keep coming back for more.
His plan was always to put the customers first.
And then there were the simple things like … smile, handle refunds promptly and go the extra mile.
Today you can see Mr. Sam’s influence decades after his passing, in Walmart’s stores…
- To make checkouts quicker, they now have lots of self-checkout registers.
- Offering a produce section that is constantly being upgraded with more variety.
- Most stores have in-store financial services.
That’s how you create a customer for life.
Being obsessed over the customer certainly helped Walmart become the world’s largest company by sales.
It’s no wonder it’s held the #1 spot for 10 years in a row.
Because it continues to follow Mr. Sam’s vision.
In 2019, Walmart launched in-home delivery during the COVID lockdowns. By 2022, it was reaching 30 million U.S. homes.
Last year Walmart generated more than $600 billion in sales.
Taking care of the customer is not only good business, it rewards shareholders by the bushel.
Remember, since Walmart’s IPO… Shareholders could have seen a gain of 1,993,000%!
This is the perfect example of what a powerful perpetual customer engine can do for a company — and its shareholders.
Today’s #1 Perpetual Customer Engine
This idea of tracking how a company treats its customers is pretty much ignored by most investors.
It never shows up in any fundamental analysis of a company — there is no balance sheet line item for the value of customer satisfaction.
As a result…
Most investors — even many so-called professionals — ignore the impact of a company’s relationship with its customers.
Not you.
Tomorrow, I’m detailing a little-known company that is taking Sam Walton’s dedication to his customers to the next level…
With a customer innovation is so unique … it effectively builds a “walled city”…
That keeps customers locked into the company … and the competition locked out.
It’s a true partnership — the customer and the company are joined at the hip.
I’m going to share it all with you at the Perpetual Customer Engine event tomorrow — including today’s #1 customer-obsessed company.
This is your last chance to save your spot at the event. So click here now.
And I’ll see you tomorrow.
Regards,
Charles Mizrahi
Founder, Alpha Investor