When in Rome, or Bentonville, Do As the Wal-Martians Do

Outsiders may call employees of the world’s largest retailer Wal-Martians.

But it’s the many vendors who often feel like aliens when they make the trek to Wal-Mart headquarters in Bentonville.

The town of 19,730 people in the Ozark Mountains is where Sam Walton built a retail empire that took over the world.

But it’s not just Bentonville anymore. It’s Boomtown, U.S.A., where a small-town dime store sprouted into the bell cow of the American economy. Last year, with $244.5 billion in revenue, Wal-Mart Stores Inc. accounted for 2.3 percent of the gross national product. Thanks largely to Wal-Mart, Bentonville is part of the sixth fastest-growing metropolitan area in the United States.

When Sam Walton moved here and opened his first dime store in 1950, his wife Helen described Bentonville as a “sad-looking country town” of fewer than 3,000 folks.

But things have changed in the past 53 years.

Bentonville is now known to many people as Vendorville, and the world is beating a path to its door. An average of 500 “suppliers” call on Wal-Mart every weekday, with a total of about 90,000 vendor visits last year. The busiest days of the week for vendor activity are Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday.

They wheel racks of dresses in through the front door and push carts full of sample products down the hallway. Grown men and women in expensive black suits hold Spider Man toys and brightly colored squirt guns.

They wait in the lobby of Wal-Mart’s Home Office until it’s time to make their pitch. Wal-Mart has 80 small rooms where vendors meet with buyers. The rooms are equipped with a table and chairs. On the wall in each room is a photo of Sam Walton and a list of rules about not accepting gifts. An hour later, time is up, and the next shift of vendors enters.

Wal-Mart treats these vendors with respect, but the world’s largest retailer doesn’t bend over backwards. Vendors can get a cup of coffee in the lobby, but a sign there asks them to drop 10 cents into the box to pay for it.

About 200 vendors have opened offices in Northwest Arkansas to serve Wal-Mart. Procter & Gamble has about 200 employees in its office in Fayetteville, 25 miles to the south. Thousands more fly into the airport in nearby Highfill every month.

When they land, the vendors know they’re on Mr. Sam’s turf, even if he did check out from this world 11 years ago. They pick up their bags and walk through Alice Walton Terminal, where a bust of Mr. Sam’s smiling daughter greets everyone who walks through the front door.

Alice Walton helped finance the airport 12 miles southwest of Bentonville. It made life easier for vendors to find the company her father founded. The airport opened in 1998.

Dos And Don’ts

There are some dos and don’ts if you’re heading for Bentonville:

n Do talk about your family. This is a family town. People wonder about you if you’re single.

n Don’t talk to anybody else about your business dealings with Wal-Mart. This is VERY important! You may want to brag about things, but Wal-Mart won’t. Wal-Mart likes to announce things when it’s good and ready. A local developer landed a deal for Wal-Mart to build a Supercenter on his property in Lowell. The developer told the local media. After it was reported on television and in newspapers, Wal-Mart backed out of the deal, leaving him for a while with a gigantic, cleared piece of empty land along Interstate 540.

n Do wear a suit to call on Wal-Mart. Lots of people wear suits to visit the Wal-Mart buyers. Women, in particular, tend to wear black skirts with matching jackets. A formal, no-nonsense business look.

n Don’t wear a suit to call on Wal-Mart. OK, this one appears to directly conflict the previous “do,” but either way appears to be fine, particularly for men. Many men wear a sports coat and slacks with an open shirt when visiting the Wal-Mart buyers. A tie sort of lets people know you’re not from around here, but that may be the message you want to broadcast. In other words, you can dress a notch more casual here than you would in New York City. You can wear khakis, but don’t even think of wearing blue jeans. It’s not that casual.

n Don’t wear ostentatious jewelry. Wedding rings are fine, but don’t get carried away with expensive jewelry. If the Wal-Martians think you’re rich (or “showy” rich, in particular), then they’ll think you’re making too much money, and they’ll be more difficult to deal with. There’s a story that floats around Bentonville about the Wal-Mart vendor who was seen unloading a big, beautiful heirloom desk at his office. The news got back to Wal-Mart’s H.Q., and the Wal-Martians bargained him down on an order on the grounds that he was obviously making too much money if he could afford a desk like that. The Wal-Mart top brass offices are not the least bit fancy.

n Don’t drive an expensive car (at least not where anybody can see you). There may be some luxury cars in the parking lot at Wal-Mart, but why risk it? A few of the old-timers at Wal-Mart still cotton to Mr. Sam’s down-home ways. He drove a 1979 Ford pickup truck with a big scratch down the side.

n Don’t be alarmed if someone says “Give me a squiggly.” A squiggly is the hyphen in “Wal-Mart” when associates do the Wal-Mart cheer. The cheer starts out with “Give me a ‘W'” and proceeds through the letters of the company name. When it reaches the hyphen, the cheerleader says “Give me a squiggly.” At that moment, everybody squats down and shakes their collective rears. Even if there are celebrities at the meeting, you’ll see them giving a squiggly. After the “T,” the cheerleader says, “What does it spell?” Of course, that part’s a no-brainer. But after that, it gets a little more confusing. At the very end of the cheer, the leader says, “Who’s No. 1?” And the answer is “The customer! Always! Whoomp!”

• Don’t get drunk in public (at least not in Bentonville). You are probably safe having a drink or two at a Bentonville restaurant, but don’t overdo it. You never know who might be watching.

• Don’t swear, not even mildly, around the Wal-Martians. “Gosh” and “shoot” are about the safest words to say in Bentonville.

• Do talk about church, if you go to one and its services don’t involve animal sacrifices. Be aware, however, that the Wal-Mart culture is based on the Protestant work ethic, so depending on your religion, you might want to avoid the topic or talk about “worship” in general.

• Don’t say “employees.” Wal-Mart has “associates,” not “employees.” Associates is a word Mr. Sam borrowed from J.C. Penney. In the culture of the upland South, people don’t so much work “for” someone as they do “with” someone. The hierarchy that is ingrained in the lowland South — in the old cotton country, which is now soybean and rice country — isn’t part of upland culture. There’s a sort of theory here that everyone is just “helping out” and all the associates benefit when Wal-Mart benefits.

• Do talk patriotically about the United States. Wal-Mart’s pro-U.S.A. mantra seems to grate on some of its international associates at the annual shareholders meetings, but it’s ingrained in the Wal-Mart culture.

• Do ask how Mrs. Helen is doing. At 83 years old, Mrs. Walton still gets around to the local Supercenter to shop and still attends the annual shareholders meetings in Fayetteville.

• Do brush up on Wal-Mart culture and background at the Wal-Mart Visitors Center on the downtown Bentonville square (105 N. Main St., 273-1329). There, in the building that housed the first Walton 5 and 10 store, you will see a recreation of Mr. Sam’s office and Mrs. Helen’s wedding dress from 1943. There’s also several exhibits related to Wal-Mart’s international divisions and a souvenir stand.

• Don’t say “Wal-Martian” around anybody at Wal-Mart.

Bentonville

If you’re stranded in Bentonville for a while, there are things to do.

The Wal-Mart Visitor’s Center is a must for vendors, but one trip will do you. It’s not Graceland.

If you’re looking for a good upscale meal, try The River Grille (1003 McClain Road, 271-4141), The Vineyard (3200 S.W. Regency Parkway, 464-9463) or Brioso Brazil (3607 Magellan Drive, 254-9933). You can also have alcoholic beverages at these restaurants. If the “chef’s special” at The River Grille happens to be grilled yellow-fin tuna ($28), get it. You won’t be disappointed.

At The Vineyard, try the Jules Verne on the dinner menu. It’s a surf-and-turf meal consisting of roasted lobster tail, Black Angus petite filet mignon, potato galette, asparagus and butter sauce ($34).

Brioso Brazil is a Brazilian churrascaria restaurant. For $28, it’s an all-you-want to eat sort of affair at dinner with waiters carving the grilled meat of your choice right at your table.

There are a handful of good lunch places in Bentonville. Smokin’ Joe’s Ribhouse (1204 S. Walton Blvd., 273-1685) serves great barbecue, and it’s cheap. Fred’s Hickory Inn (1502 N. Walton Blvd., 273-3303) also specializes in smoked meats and is a tad more upscale.

For a quick sandwich, there’s Panera Bread Co. (201 S.W. 14th St., 271-8009), The Station Cafe (111 N. Main St., 273-0553), Ozark Mountain Smokehouse (2702 N. Walton Blvd., 273-2025) and Bentonville Meat & SeafoodCo.. (113 W. Central St., 273-7006).

Coffee Corner (813 W. Central St., Suite 8, 464-7330) serves an espresso mocha that puts Starbuck’s swill to shame.

If you’ve got a couple of hours to kill, you could work out at Gold’s Gym (2414 S.E. J St.,464-4653) in Bentonville or drive to Rogers, five miles to the east, and catch a movie at Malco’s Cinema 12 in Scottsdale Center (621 N. 46th St., 631-5865). It’s the only stadium-seating movie theater in Northwest Arkansas.

People in Bentonville think they have traffic problems, but to people from cities, Bentonville has almost no traffic at all. Traffic is congested around Wal-Mart’s Home Office for about half an hour starting at 8 a.m. and then again at 5 p.m. as people get off work. The parking lot, however, is about half full by 6:30 a.m., so these people are early birds.

Fayetteville

If you’re in the area overnight and want to imbibe, get out of Bentonville. Head 25 miles to the south on Interstate 540, and you’ll find Fayetteville, population 58,047.

Fayetteville, which is home to the University of Arkansas, was recently named by the Milken Institute as the top city for job growth in the United States (although the praise was really meant for the metropolitan statistical area that includes Rogers, Bentonville and Springdale).

Lots of things in Fayetteville are named for the Waltons. Walton Arena is home to the university’s basketball team. And the Walton Arts Center on Dickson Street has performing arts and visiting celebrities like Bill Cosby.

As the entertainment capital of Northwest Arkansas, Dickson Street has half a dozen clubs where you can hear live music and do a little dancing if the spirit moves you. George’s Majestic Lounge (519 W. Dickson St., 442-4226) has a great beer garden. On summer nights, you can kick back and listen to an acoustic band outside while a head-banging band rocks out inside.

Dave’s on Dickson (245 Powerhouse Ave., 571-3333) attracts national performers who are passing through the area.

Note: The area code for all telephone numbers listed in this story is 479.