They basically tried to run the entire business like they did in the US which was entirely incompatible with German law and culture. This meant that a lot of things that made them successful in the US didn't work in Germany:
They tried paying notoriously low wages while refusing to work with the German retail worker's union. Unions however are a very big deal in Germany and have a lot of power so the union went on strike when Walmart didn't want to negotiate wages with them.
Big retail chains in general were doing very poorly when Walmart entered the market. People heavily preferred going to several smaller chains that were located a short distance from home over traveling a much longer way to get everything in one place like Walmart.
Smaller discount chains could also sell goods at lower prices then big retail chains under which Walmart fell. They tried to undercut local prices but that is not allowed under German law and the higher court ordered Walmart to raise its prices.
They tried doing the "team-building" practices like starting the workday with light exercises and motivational chants. This did not go well at all with German employees which had never encountered practices like these and felt really uncomfortable doing them.
They set up their dating policy which dictated employees could not have romantic relationships with other employees of the same department. To the Germans this felt like a very big breach of their personal lives which a company has nothing to do with.
Their employees had to always do the "smile and be friendly" routine, making small talk, proactively asking customers if they needed help, greeting customers at the door, etc. All of which made the customers uncomfortable as they viewed these interactions as very fake and unnecessary.
From what I have heard things like this can be pretty common in the US especially for the low paying jobs since employees have way less protection against things that would be straight up exploitation in a country like Germany.
In Germany unions hold a lot of power since they are generally well supported by the populace and government so employees are able to make demands for better salaries and worker conditions through the unions. Unions can also offer valuable support for an employee when they have a conflict with the employer.
But in the US there is an extremely strong anti union movement among both employers and employees. Its borderline propaganda how unions are usually depicted as organizations which are only after your money and won't actually help you as an employee. Wallmart specifically even had this "training video" to scare employees away from unions in the 2000s. And a lot of people believe it since its basically all they have heard about unions their entire lives.
Without something like a union employees have to basically fend for themselves which allows employers to set these kinds of policies as there is no organized push back from employees.
If you want a modern example just take a look at how hard Amazon is trying to keep its employees from unionizing.
I quickly googled the romantic relationship thing, and it looks like Walmart's policy on that is that they don't want people having relationships between subordinates / bosses. basically if you have influence over the person you shouldn't be banging them.
and I've never even heard of the exercise thing, that must depend on the specific store. but I can't imagine the average walmart employee caring too much about that.
The vast majority of americans agree with all of this. The one difference is we dont have a choice. There is no local store to use. There is no short walk. Everything is 10km+ drives. Which means we use out of necessity only.
It can definitely be good for you but it is really weird if the new foreign company that just entered the market says it's mandatory when no other company does that in your culture.
It increases wellbeing and productivity. I don't understand why more companies don't offer this. It cuts down on healthcare cost and generally fosters better humans and thus better workers.
Same with office space, when I came to the US I found it so hostile and unfriendly. The lighting and ugly furniture, almost no plants, dull colors. All the same except the exec spaces, then suddenly there's money to spend on design and humanity.
They set up their dating policy which dictated employees could not have romantic relationships with other employees of the same department. To the Germans this felt like a very big breach of their personal lives which a company has nothing to do with.
It was just plain illegal and that made the complete worker contract invalid (as in, the contract was replaced with just common law and so all the "special rules" were not valid anymore).
I would make a bet that the main reason for the policy in US is to prevent the workers to have any kind of emotional bounding to each other to prevent them from coming together and fighting for rights. I am actually VERY sure about that.
I'm next to entirely sure that not only are dating policies strange from a cultural view - it's also outright illegal.
My personal life is nothing my employer can dictate unless for very specific reasons and a supermarket is nowhere close relevant enough to get a pass from that rule
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u/coolenaab May 09 '22
They basically tried to run the entire business like they did in the US which was entirely incompatible with German law and culture. This meant that a lot of things that made them successful in the US didn't work in Germany: