Wal-Mart has launched a full blown damage control strategy to counter bad
press. In a

New York Times article today, they describe a “war” room which is staffed by
past political strategist.

BENTONVILLE, Ark., Oct. 26 – Inside a stuffy, windowless room here,
veterans of the 2004 Bush and Kerry presidential campaigns sit, stand and
pace around six plastic folding tables. Open containers of pistachio nuts
and tropical trail mix compete for space with laptops and BlackBerries. CNN
flickers on a television in the corner.

The phone rings, and a 20-something woman answers. “Turn on Fox,” she
yells, running up to the TV with a notepad. “This could be important.”

A scene from a campaign war room? Well, sort of. It is a war room inside
the headquarters of Wal-Mart, the giant discount retailer that hopes to sell
a new, improved image to reluctant consumers.

Wal-Mart is taking a page from the modern political playbook. Under fire
from well-organized opponents who have hammered the retailer with criticisms
of its wages, health insurance and treatment of workers, Wal-Mart has
quietly recruited former presidential advisers, including Michael K. Deaver,
who was Ronald Reagan’s image-meister, and Leslie Dach, one of Bill
Clinton’s media consultants, to set up a rapid-response public relations
team in Arkansas.

Article continues

here.

I wonder how much they are paying for this damage control? Last week a memo
from Wal-Mart executives leaked into the press. The contents of the memo was
some drastic and risky attempts to curtail growing health care costs. Add that
to the continued debate over Wal-Mart’s low wages and you get full blown image
damage. If they would stop worrying about public image so much and take the
money being spent on this “war” room and pump it back into wages and benefits
then perhaps Wal-Mart would not be in the position they are today.

You can view a segment ran on this morning’s Today Show about film producer
Robert Greenwald’s latest piece of work attacking the blue box giant. The link
is

here.