::A Geek in Korea::

Wal-Mart,  has completely left Korea, selling their assets to E-Mart, the dominant Korean owned retail food outlet in the country. The local Wal-Mart across the street from my apartment has now been completely re-branded as E-Mart for around two months.  There also other problems with the change over to a Korean owned company.This is all anecdotal, but I’ve been feeling the sting of the change recently.

Since the change, all the old Wal-Mart branded items have either been sold out, or removed from the shelves, significantly diminishing the product mix. I now have less choices about what to purchase. Just because Wal-Mart chose to stock five different kinds of oatmeal that I never bought instead of three, the fact that I no longer have a choice to buy any of those items if I chose to, stinks. I don’t think Wal-Mart’s product mix was right for Korea, but it was nice, as a foreigner, to stumble upon something long neglected on a shelf and purchase it. This isn’t how you run a business however. Maximizing shelf space is one of the ways of keeping costs down and profitability high.

Perhaps E-Mart really has a better product mix, but I doubt it matters that much. Between different retailers in Korea, there is a disturbing amount of homogeneity. Outside of Costco, retail stores in Korea all stock the same items. E-mart does have generic items like Wal-Mart did, but they are, by and large, copies of Korean foods that are well established. Wal-Mart had generic items with no Korean equivalent which was good for me at times.

Parallel with the decrease in foreign items and Wal-Mart specific brands being taken off the shelf, there has been an increase in the number of people in the store whenever I shop at E-Mart. There happens to be another E-Mart not far from the Wal-Mart that was taken over. I stopped going to that original E-Mart location because I would get stressed out from the crowds. The place was insanely popular. There were times where there wasn’t room to walk, there weren’t enough carts for the shoppers, and the simple act of trying to check out could take as long as the shopping experience itself.

The Wal-Mart near our apartment, pre-liquidation, was much less busy. It was usually empty, with the employees outnumbering the customers. This lead to a much more pleasant shopping experience for myself. I don’t like fighting for carts or needing to push people out of the way to get down the aisle, but that’s just me. While there were only a few check out lanes operating at any one time, the line was never more than a few minutes to check out. This wasn’t retail heaven or anything, but you could get in and out of the store in a few minutes if you tried.

Now, when I got to the newly E-Mart branded store, I’m seeing the crowds and insanity that was prevalent at the other location where I stopped shopping. Is this all spillover? Did people get fed up with that location like I did, and start shopping at the second location down the street. Did people from other nearby stores defect now that there is an E-mart in a closer location? Where the hell did all these people come from, and where did they shop when Wal-Mart was here? At any time when I enter the new E-Mart, ever checkout lane is not only full, but the line is backed up and waiting. It’s the same stuff you can buy anywhere else. It’s not cheaper or more attractively displayed. Why are all these people shopping here now? It’s insane. The other E-Mart location is doing the same amount of business from what I’ve seen, despite the fact that there are twice the number of stores in the same neighborhood of town. They must be doing something right.

What’s going on? Did people instinctively stay away from Wal-Mart, but are somehow entranced by the yellow glow of E-mart? Does the "Happy E-mart Song" have anything to do with this?

I just don’t get it.