SAM WALTON

One of my favourite books is Sam Waltons's "Made In America". Where money and wealth was concerned, he seemed to espouse an interesting old fashioned view, and was not ashamed to say so. He in fact wrote this book on his death bed; he was suffering from bone cancer; so one can imagine he would speak of what he thought very important.

Anyway - here is an abstract from his book :-


"So along comes Forbes in 1985 and says I'm the richest man in America. Well, there's no question that if you multiply the Wal-Mart stock price by how much we own, then maybe we are worth $20 or $30 billion, or whatever they say. The family may have those kinds of assets, but I have never seen that myself. For one thing, Helen and I only own 20 percent of our family's total interest in Wal-Mart. For another, as long as I have anything to do with it - and I'm confident this attitude will last at least another generation - most of that Wal-Mart stock is staying right where it is. We don't need the money. We don't need to buy a yacht. And thank goodness we never thought we had to go out and buy anything like an island. We just don't have those kinds of needs or ambitions, which wreck a lot of companies when they get along in years. Some families sell their stock off a little at a time to live high, and then - boom - somebody takes them over, and it all goes down the drain. One of the real reasons I'm writing this book is so my grandchildren and great-grandchildren will read it years from now and know this : If you start any of that foolishness, I'll come back and haunt you. So don't even think about it.

Not that I am trying to poor mouth here. We certainly have had more than adequate funds in this family for a long time - even before we got Wal-Mart cranked up. Here's the thing : money never has meant that much to me, not even in the sense of keeping score. If we had enough groceries, and a nice place to live, plenty of room to keep and feed my bird dogs, a place to hunt, a place to play tennis, and the means to get the kids good educations - thats rich. No question about it. And we have it. We're not crazy. We don't live like paupers the way some people depict us. We all love to fly, and we have nice airplanes, but I've owned about eighteen airplanes over the years, and I never bought one of them new. We have our family meetings at fine places like the Ritz Carlton in Naples, Florida or the Del Coronado in San Diego. This house we live in was designed by E. Fay Jones, who lives down the road in Fayettville and is a world-famous disciple of Frank Lloyd Wright. And even though I think it costs too much, I have to admit that its beautiful - but in a real simple, natural kind of way.

We're not ashamed of having money, but I just don't believe a big showy lifestyle is appropriate for anywhere, least of all here in Bentonville where folks work hard for their money and where we all know that everyone puts on their trousers one leg at a time. I'm not sure I ever figured out this celebrity business. Why in the world for example, would I get an invitation to Elizabeth Taylor's wedding out in Hollywood? I still can't believe it was news that I get my hair cut at the barbershop. Where else would I get it cut? Why do I drive a pickup truck? What am I supposed to haul my dogs around in, a Rolls-Royce?"


Samuel Moore Walton
(1918 - 1992)