A New American Town - Bentonville, Arkansas
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A New American Town - Bentonville, Arkansas
A Walk Through Walmart’s History
Join Visit Bentonville and the Walmart Museum Director as we share the untold stories that bring Walmart's history to life at the Walmart Museum in Bentonville, Arkansas! Whether you're a first-time visitor or a frequent traveler, this episode is packed with heartwarming memories and tips for visiting this main attraction.
Come on over to see Bentonville's first museum and experience Bentonville's culture like a local! walmartmuseum.com
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Welcome back to A New American Town. I'm your host, natalie, and today I'm joined by Kurt from the Walmart Museum as one of our first tourist attractions here in Bentonville. The Walton 5 and Dime and the Walmart Museum are a city staple. This iconic building is where it all started for Sam Walton, the founder of Walmart, which is now the Fortune One company in the world and headquartered right here in Bentonville. Today we're excited to tell you about what's new inside the museum, what you can expect when you visit and a few behind-the scenes stories that bring the Walmart legacy to life, from interactive exhibits to the classic Spark Cafe. It's more than just a museum. It's a time capsule of American retail and small town roots. Thank you so much for joining me today, kurt.
Speaker 2:Yeah, thanks for having me, Natalie.
Speaker 1:I'm so excited to talk more about the Walmart Museum. When I first moved here to Bentonville two years ago, it was still under renovation and so I wasn't able to see it until earlier this last spring, and it's just blown my world, blown my socks off. I love it and I feel like our community has totally embraced it all over again and it's so special. So I don't know just, can you give us a little quick snippet of what people can expect when they come to the Walmart Museum?
Speaker 2:Yeah, we really excited to finish what was more than a renovation. As a lot of people know, we put in a lot of time, effort and energy and really rebuilding the Terry Block building and the visitor center so that it'll stand the test of time and be here for another hundred years, which is really exciting. We have twice the exhibition space. We still have the Five and Dime that everyone loves, we have the Spark Cafe with amazing ice cream yarnels from Arkansas that people love, and then we have old-time favorites, sam's Office, sam's Truck, and a lot of new exhibits too and new storytelling. So it's been great so far.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's so special because the upstairs you get into the whole new era in the 2000s and the newer storytelling and, oh my gosh, there's just so much we could talk about. Like, right, when you walk through the front door you step into what was the Five and Dime, and is that what it originally looked like?
Speaker 2:Yeah, the Five and Dime gift shop variety store we have today is designed to evoke what variety stores were like in the 1950s. So you see a lot of you know dark wood. You see the red and green tiled floor. Sam Walton was famously frugal when he was renovating the store in 1950. One of the local tile salesmen had a whole bunch of red and green tile and was willing to sell it to Sam for dirt cheap. And so Sam's like great, let's do it and we even have some. He had mismatched colors because he got a real deal on it. So you see the red and green tile when you come in. It's not a design choice, it was entirely for low cost.
Speaker 2:And you see a lot of nostalgic product products, vintage candies the candy's um you know enamel, coffee mugs, all kinds of like old-time toys and um, people love that experience and it really sets the tone for what the 50s were like. And then you walk through the glass doors and start to experience the walmart museum story and it starts in the 50s.
Speaker 2:Well, we talk a little bit about Sam Walton's childhood. He grew up, he was born in Oklahoma in 1918. He was really a child of the Great Depression and he learned the value of a dollar really early on in life. So we just really set the tone with that story. We talk about the role that Helen Walton and Bud Walton and the Robson family played in the creation of you know, both Mr Sam's retail passion and the company. And then kind of at the end of that story you see his office preserved as it was in 1991. Then the museum sort of takes off and tells the story you know chronologically from there.
Speaker 1:The office space is so magnificent. It's crazy to me. I mean, you really do step back into time. You guys have preserved the space so well, and I remember hearing a specific story about a woman that documented every single item. Can you tell our listeners more about that?
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's a really cool story because when Sam Walton passed away yeah, it's a really cool story because when Sam Walton passed away, we had an associate who worked at the Visitor Center. Her name was Betty Holmes she's Betty Kazire now and she said you know, I think visitors would want to see Mr Sam's office. And somebody said, okay, well, you got to go talk to David Glass. David Glass was the CEO at the time. He said great, you have a week, call Walmart maintenance. And so Betty, having worked at the visitor center, went to Sam's office, used a camcorder big VCR camcorder and a bunch of photos and documented everything.
Speaker 2:There. We have 788 items that were preserved. She knew where every single thing goes, but if it wasn't for her idea, frankly we probably wouldn't have a museum today. She realized the importance of Mr Sam, his office space and what visitors would want to see. At Walmart we talk about. Our best ideas come from our associates and I've got to meet Betty on a couple of occasions. I'm grateful for her because if it weren't for her, I probably wouldn't get to do this amazing dream job.
Speaker 1:Wow, I love that. Oh, my goodness, you guys have like a little touch screen that you can walk up to and look at every single item and what it meant to Sam and what it meant to Walmart, and it really is so inspiring to see the thought out detail and that you guys have continued to pay homage to what Betty did and you don't just ever look that, and that is truly the Walmart legacy. It's so cool.
Speaker 2:Yeah, her fingerprints are all over the museum. She was the one that drove Mr Sam's truck inside the museum in the early 90s. Oh my gosh, we've got a really cool video of that, the desk detective game that we have outside Sam's office. One of the things that's cool about the museum is, as digital technology gets better, we can continue to update how we tell the stories and how interactive they are with visitors with very little disruption and rework, and so that's one thing I'm really excited about is like we're already starting to think through what's the next way we tell this story, how do we continue to make the visitor experience better?
Speaker 2:And you know, we've been open less than six months and we're already thinking through like, hey, what else can we do to make the visit awesome for associates, our community tourists et cetera.
Speaker 1:Why are you not surprised? Why does that just totally feel like a Walmart thing?
Speaker 2:That's the thing is like you know, most companies probably would spend this much time and energy building a museum and they'd be like we're not touching it Right building a museum and they'd be like we're not touching right. And at walmart, like we get something, we get it in place, and then we immediately are like and these things we want to go make better um it's a lot of fun, yeah, yeah learn fast, super exciting. Make improvements, keep going yeah.
Speaker 1:Is there any sneak peeks you can give us about some upgrades you guys are looking to do in the future, or is it still just?
Speaker 2:nothing, nothing official, but I really do think that how we tell some of the key stories and how we make the visitor experience a little bit more self-service, um, I think people will see over the next three or four months like small changes yeah that make a big impact in how we tell our stories.
Speaker 1:That's so cool, yeah, so right after Sam's office. That's when you so the Walmart Museum. You really walk through the decades and you go over time of when the first super center opened up all the way to present day, which is why the second story expansion was so exciting and because there was just so much more space to talk about everything that Walmart has done for the world. Really, um, my favorite part because I'm a communications girl is all the old advertisements oh yeah, in the stairs yes, oh my gosh.
Speaker 1:And like the 70s, like the display case that you guys have on the corner of, like looking at what it looked like when old Coke cans would be displayed and went versus, you know, as palettes, versus. I'm not going to use any of the right terminology, but do you have a favorite item on the first floor?
Speaker 2:Ooh, that's a good question. Well, I'll say more. I love seeing people come through the galleries and talk about what the merchandise meant to them. You can almost pick out how old people are by which toys resonate with them. You see a grandmother with a grandson and she's explaining what these products were in the 50s or the 60s or the 70s or the 60s or the 70s, or even, like me, like I hadn't thought about micromachines in forever until I saw old, legit micromachines in the, I think the 80s case or the 90s case, and so that's really fun to see how people connect with the merchandise itself From an artifact standpoint.
Speaker 2:In the 60s we have this floor plan. Clarence Lease was our store manager at store number one. Store number one was kind of famously unorganized with merchandise kind of spread all out. And Clarence for store number two when it opened in Harrison, arkansas, he hand drew, he drafted out. He clearly had taken a drafting class hand drew a floor plan and you look at it today it's 63 years old. If you were to put grocery on the right-hand side of that, you'd have apparel in the middle, you'd have service counters for beauty and things like that and you'd have toys and electronics and automotive. It looks just like a super center.
Speaker 2:And so it's so cool to see. Like you know, the layout of Walmart over 60 years started with a person who had an important role to play at Walmart also had an important role to play in the community. Multiple generations of kids and grandkids have worked at Walmart, and so that's the story that I love to tell.
Speaker 1:Like the start of consumer shopping intelligence right there. Wow, yeah, and it's kind of like you know at Walmart.
Speaker 2:We've got a campaign for our marketing team about who knew, and it's like who knew. The layout of the Walmart you love to shop in today can be traced all the way back to a hand-drawn drawing in 1964-ish.
Speaker 1:Is it the original version?
Speaker 2:in the museum it's it's like so that that one's cool. Um, in the 70s we have a can of spray paint. The the first everyday low-priced item at walmart was a can of spray paint, and you know why yeah, yeah, six times a year spray paint is sold.
Speaker 2:historically, in the 60s was sold, or in the 70s was sold, or in the 70s excuse me, it was sold two for a dollar. So, like during the holidays, spray paint was 50 cents a can. The rest of the year it was about $1.40 a can and that's really hard to manage inventory and sales and having enough space to sell that much spray paint. And Jack Shoemaker, who's a really important leader for Walmart through our whole history, he said you know what? We just priced this at 88 cents all year round. And that's really part of Walmart's secret sauce, which is how do we make sure we serve customers in the best way at the lowest prices consistently?
Speaker 2:I was telling this story and a lady who was on the tour was probably about 70. She goes oh my gosh. That's why we always had to wait until things were on sale before we bought stuff. You know, towels and linens were always on sale at a certain time, hardware and appliances were at a different time. Electronics, toys, et cetera, et cetera, everyday. Low price totally allowed people to shop whenever they need something at a low price. So the spray paint is a super interesting story where people just don't realize how revolutionary it was to go from high prices and big sales to a low price all year round.
Speaker 1:You've just blown my mind Something that we all take for granted, wow.
Speaker 2:And some retailers still play the high-low game. Some you know President's Day, sale and everything's 40% off. I'm like kind of off that, but you don't think about like how revolutionary it was to just go oh, I need spray paint, I can count on that being available at the lowest price whenever I need it, not waiting until I might need it and then I go buy more than I need.
Speaker 2:Yeah, In the nineties we have um Sam Walton wrote his book made in America with John Huey and we have a manuscript where Sam has written notes, where he's crossed out words and made adjustments and stuff. And what sticks out to me is he changes a lot of words to we and our um. He always thought about it as you know, us as a company, all of the associates, it wasn't him, it wasn't him and bud, or him and Helen, it was all of us. And it's really cool to kind of see that in the moment and his writing and in his thoughts.
Speaker 1:That is really cool. I love that portion. Right across from it is Sam's old truck, which people just love to look at, and you guys have like three or four trucks.
Speaker 2:And there's not very many people that obsessively collect 1979 Ford F-150s with red and white paint jobs, but we're in the business of those. Sam Walton's original truck is inside.
Speaker 2:It's a 79. It's got about 65,000 miles on it. Sam was famously not a great driver. It's definitely well used. Also, there was no plan to save the truck. One of his grandkids was driving it after he passed away. It was in a warehouse for a while. It was going to go to South Texas and then Betty, who we talked about earlier. Betty was like hey, we should. People would love to see his truck too.
Speaker 2:And the truck is more about, I think, Sam's humility, kind of his everyman mentality. There's this famous quote that he said, which is you know, why do people expect me to drive a Rolls Royce? What am I going to haul my dogs in? You know his hunting dogs were always with him. It's a work truck. Um, our truck. The steering wheel has been chewed on by many a dog. Um, that's how you know.
Speaker 2:It's the original we have. Um, our replica outside. We named betty in honor of betty, who's like the reason we get to tell these amazing stories. Um, one of betty's co-workers, um, veronica. So we have another replica over that sits by the visitor center on the home office on 8th street and then, yeah, you know, if we come across another one, that's an amazing condition. Like they're really great tools to to tell the Sam story and to take them on the road to different Walmart meetings. And and then we have some red and white Ford Lightnings. So we have the modern day electric, fully sustainable version that we use for programming. Take people around campus, take them around the region, that's pretty fun.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that is fun. I love that you can see the truck through the ice cream shop. Peace Bar Cafe.
Speaker 2:Yeah, in the old museum you could only see one side of the truck because it was up against a wall and so we rotated the truck 90 degrees and now you can see three sides. And as you come in the Spark Cafe, as you're walking up to order, you see one whole side of the truck that wasn't available to see before.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I love that intentionality before. Yeah, I love that intentionality. So I just have to ask why the Spark Cafe? What was the original point of having it used to be Spark Soda Fountain correct? Was that just a common thing at Five and Dimes or discount shops back in the day?
Speaker 2:Yeah, and more probably a little bit less so in variety stores than like pharmacies often had like a soda fountain or a soda counter. And so you know, every good museum has three things they have an amazing museum, they also have an amazing gift shop and they have a really good restaurant or food option. And so the way we've thought about programming is the Five, and.
Speaker 2:Dime is kind of our gift shop. We also welcome you into the gift shop, first to kind of set the tone, and then the Spark Cafe. I mean Yarnell's ice cream at super low prices.
Speaker 1:I know it's crazy.
Speaker 2:I mean it's always busy.
Speaker 1:That's why it's packed. It's always packed. People are down the road waiting for hours to get like $1.30 ice cream. That's good, it's so good, and you guys have amazing offerings. You have gluten-free cones, you have dairy-free ice cream. You are very um versed in your offerings. It's really great.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I'm really proud of um the, the team that runs the spark cafe. Like I mean, it has been full gas since we opened the doors yeah and they've done a really amazing job.
Speaker 2:To just like walmart, right. Keep fine-tuning your processes, keep making things smoother and more efficient. We actually edited down the menu a little bit. We took some things off the menu to make it much easier for both our visitors and our associates behind the counter, and we're really cranking through the people, which is fun, Even if you, you know, standing in a line outside the door 15 minutes maybe to the front of the line and you know.
Speaker 1:I guess it looks like you'll stand there for an hour. No, you guys are really quick. Yep, that's awesome. So last thing while we wrap up, do you have any last minute tips for visitors that come to the Walmart?
Speaker 2:museum. Definitely Number one is go to the second floor. Um, so many people are used to it only being in one floor they kind of think the story's over on the first floor. Um, as you walk up the stairs, you're just surrounded and enveloped by all these vintage newspaper circular ads. By all these vintage newspaper circular ads.
Speaker 2:I love watching visitors, especially children, point to old toys or old video games, or you can see some of the styles that were popular that are coming back. And then people point to the prices and they're like oh man, things are even cheaper today than they were back in the day, which is kind of cool. Yeah, so you walk up and then the whole second floor is really reimagined in this bright and airy experience where we talk about Walmart you know, we tell the story of Katrina and sustainability, we talk about our supply chain. We have a really cool exhibit about celebrities I'm not going to spoil who the celebrity is, but super popular and then, up on the second floor too, we have the Hologram Theater where you can hear from Sam Walton in a really impressive digital rendering about things he said and knew. You can talk to him?
Speaker 1:Yeah, you can ask him questions. Yeah, so cool.
Speaker 2:And then we also celebrate the Presidential Medal of Freedom. Sam Walton was awarded that Medal of Freedom nearly three weeks before he passed away and at the end of that he said a couple things that resonate with me. One he said I thought we were quietly, humbly living our lives down here in Arkansas. He always viewed himself as kind of a humble, sort of you know, almost introspective person. I don't think he nearly recognized like the magnitude and impact that he really had. The other thing he talks about is our secret is, at the time, all 3 380,000 associates working together. Um, I think that's still true today.
Speaker 2:Like Walmart is not any one person. It's our culture, it's our purpose, um, it's our like. I hope we can help lower the cost of living and help people save money so they can live a better life all over the world. We'd barely gone into Mexico and Canada, but he really understood the ethos of this whole company is our purpose, which is to save money and live better, and so we really celebrate that. Up on the second floor and at the end there's a really fun exhibit for kids where they can design a Walmart Spark sticker. We've printed probably 100,000 stickers already Super popular. You can see them all over now. So the second floor is really really great.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I agree, it's so special. I hope every visitor gets to see it. You guys have awesome hours too. You're open super early.
Speaker 2:Yeah, we're pretty friendly we open 10 am to 9 pm. That's awesome 10 to 10 on Friday and Saturday and noon to 6 on Sunday.
Speaker 1:Wow, so there's no reason people should miss this thing.
Speaker 2:Come on down?
Speaker 1:Yeah, cool, cool. Well, is there any way people can get connected with you guys? Should they get tickets online?
Speaker 2:No need for tickets, it's always free.
Speaker 1:Yes, it is, we love that.
Speaker 2:Come on in anytime. The doors are open. Walmartmuseumcom. You can also learn a little bit more about us there and, yeah, anytime you're there. One of the things I'm most proud of we get a lot of comment cards, and probably four out of every five talk about how awesome our museum guides are. I take great joy in seeing our staff interact with all the visitors, associates, people from out of state, out of country. Our guides are amazing and any questions you have, any stories you want to tell or have told to you, engage with them and they'll make your visit even better.
Speaker 1:I agree, yay, well, thank you so much for joining us on the podcast today. Kirk yeah of course it was so great as always. If you guys are coming to visit Bentonville, don't forget to check out visitbentonvillecom for more visitor information and follow us online at visitbentonville. See you in.