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Major brands pull away from Walmart/Moosejaw

coskigirl

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cantunamunch

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I still think this is about the Walmart name and not about any pricing/market control issues. I can see that - even I feel that one of my favourite climbing short brands, Gramicci, went downmarket with this.
 

dbostedo

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There may not be a lot yet... One other way to look at things... If you hover over "Premium Outdoor Brands", you get this list :

A - E
Benchmade
Craghoppers
CW-X
Duluth Pack
Eider
ExOfficio
F - K
Gramicci
Grand Trunk
Jack Wolfskin
Klymit
Komperdell
Kurgo
L - P
LuminAID
Maxim Ropes
Moosejaw
Orca Coolers
PacSafe
Pajar
Pelican
Q - Z
Showers Pass
SlumberJack
Stonewear Designs
Tentsile
Teton Sports
Turtle Fur
Zensah

The only obvious ski brand I notice there is Komperdell... clicking on that does in fact show you a bunch of Komperdell ski poles, many of which are listed as "Ships and Sold from Moosejaw". I'm guessing they're getting things sorted, and that Black Diamond doesn't want to be in that list.
 

Doug Briggs

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I don't know about Moosejaw (other than the bar in Frisco) so...

Is the point here that the brands that are pulling out were previously legitimately associated with Moosejaw but when Walmart came onto the scene, the brands rescinded their association with Moosejaw because of the Walmart association?
 

sjjohnston

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From what I can tell, Walmart has been associated with Moosejaw (at least generally) from when they bought it a year and a half ago. It looks like what's changed, and what's inciting chagrin among suppliers, is including a link to a Moosejaw web store on the main Walmart website.

It seems (I guess) like there are two aspects: (i) association with the Walmart brand name and (ii) increased push into broad-market online retailing. The former is really more a matter of image and show, but I'm no expert on branding and marketing. The latter might be the bigger issue. It's an aspect of a wholesale (if you will) change in the retail market for goods: from service-oriented brick-and-mortar stores to big-selection price-driven online retailing, In a sense, it's sort of a disintermediation ... or, anyway, the replacement of the old human and physical intermediaries with a website and a fulfillment system that ships to buyers direct from warehouses.

I don't think that has much to do with Walmart particularly. As noted in some of the reporting, that's really Amazon's doing, and Walmart is just trying to stay alive as people are doing less walking into massive low-service stores to pick off shelves holding a relatively limited selection of quite cheap stuff in favor of sitting at a computer and browsing a much bigger selection of cheap and mid-priced and expensive stuff at what's (in each case) is likely to be at least pretty close to the best price available.
 

Lauren

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I wonder how many of these manufacturers that are pulling away already had regulations on their products in regards to selling on Walmart.com.

Retailers have strict regulations written into their contracts with the manufacturer on if and what they can sell on Amazon, Walmart, eBay, or other similar sites. I would asssume these manufacturers and Moosejaw already had these contracts in place. This “outdoor premier gear” site is described as “curated by Moosejaw”, so the product is owned, and distributed by Moosejaw, just sold on Walmart.com.

Just a thought...this seems to possibly be more than simply not selling on Walmart.com, but possibly a violation of the contracts already in place.
 

Wilhelmson

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I would guess that there is also some concern by these companies that the people selling their product understand their product and it's use. A lot of the gear that companies like Black Diamond sell is very specialized and its correct use is the difference between life and death.

The idea of some never-evers buying climbing equipment at Walmart, misusing the equipment and causing their injury/death is horrifying to me.

Are we talking about outdoor equipment or guns?
 

cantunamunch

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Not sure what the old Sports Authority pattern is....? Please explain for me.

The idea is that the brand still own their goods so that a retailer is only responsible for their operating cost, and doesn't incur the credit expenses required for outright purchase every season. Good idea except when it doesn't go well.

https://sgbonline.com/sports-authority-consignment-dispute-exposes-reliance-on-big-box-retailers/

I still wonder what proportion of this is still just due to the Walmart name, and consignment fears could be part of f the iceberg we're not seeing. I'm not saying they are, but it is yet another dimension of unknowns.
 

Lauren

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@cantunamunch - Thanks for the explanation. I’m not sure exactly what Moosejaw’s business model is...definitely an unknown to me. Even if the product is on consignment and not outright owned by Moosejaw, I would think similar contracts apply to regulate where they can list the product.
 

jmeb

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Are we talking about outdoor equipment or guns?

Both potentially. I was just speculating one reason why outdoor technical gear brands may not want to be at walmart.

Of course it's every brands choice to make. If my speculation has a grain of truth, then maybe those outdoor brands care more about consumer safety than the gun brands sold at Walmart. Or maybe Walmart has trained gun staff. They certainly don't have climbing staff.
 

Doeschna

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I’m not clear on this, are they pulling out of Moosejaw?
Yes they pulled out of Moosejaw. There were a few companies that pulled out of MJ upon their sale to Walmart. The others are following suit after their stuff being listed on Walmart’s website. Was in a MJ yesterday and it appears the only Patagonia and Arcteryx they have is what was leftover from previous seasons.
 

Philpug

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I saw the consignment relationship with Sports Authorit first hand. Back in the 90's, the Philadelphia region of Sport Authority;s ski department was actually inventory from Langhorne Ski & Sport. Langehorne supplied the inventory, staffed the department and did all the tuning. I worked at the Wilmington location, ours was a unique situation in that where the other stores would send thier gear back to Langhorne for shop work, our shop manager used to have his own shop and still had all the mounting/tuning stuff at his house so we did all of our work basically over night. We we also in a good position to cherry pick sales because Delaware had no sales tax. Occasionally, someone would come in to check prices expecting jsut base line equipment, we would explain that we were actaully Langhorne and picked up quite a few sales by bringing in the specific ski they wanted. This is when the Salomon SuperForce was THE hot ski and we sold easily a dozen pair there.
 

Bruuuce

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Interesting. I didn’t know Wally World had purchased Moosejaw. Do you know why these brands don’t want to be associated with Walmart?

In addition to what others wrote, they may be rolling their vendor programs into the Walmart model. As someone with intimate knowledge of this process, it is an expensive and nightmarish experience for small vendors. The vendors also get the benefit of distancing themselves from the Walmart brand.
 
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