This is a very very interesting journal that looks into the daily struggles of Walmart employees. As a British reader, having this insight into American consumerism helped me understand the structure of American economics and business life.

This is a very honest book without being offensive to anyone. It was really nice to get to see the human side of retail workers.

Good journalism!

Thanks to NetGalley for this ARC!
Walmart is famous throughout the US, Canada, and Mexico for its low prices. However, they are also famous for low wages and demanding, wacky customers. (A glance at the site PeopleOfWalmart.com may tell you all you need to know). In this book, journalist Hugo Meunier goes undercover for 3 months as a Walmart associate, then emerges to tell us all about the good, the bad, and the ugly behind the scenes.
The corporation at the top is a warm, family-oriented company. At the store level, it is a place where low pay and hard work go hand in hand. There are stories of employees who cannot afford good food, despite the generous 10% off card they are given. There is an almost cultlike atmosphere in team meetings each morning (Give me a W! Give me an A! Give me an L …) and each associate is encouraged to tattle on those team members who “steal time”. Heavy, heavy emphasis is placed on the customer always being right, with posters in the break room exhorting staff to remember that “The most important person you will meet is your next customer”. Meunier portrays the clientele as brutish, demanding, and thankless. That sounds like most customers in retail – but to hear the author’s inner monologue as he complies with their demands is funny. This monologue will also be familiar to those who work in any service industry.
Something struck me amongst all the descriptions of hard work, lazy colleagues, clueless managers, and low pay. The author is someone with a good paying job and a high-end lifestyle – so the juxtaposition between his real job and his Walmart job is telling. He even notes that he misses sleeping in and not having to punch a clock. Perhaps the most elitist moment is when he notes the difference between Walmart’s and his newspaper’s holiday party. One is filled with wine, truffles and caviar…and the other is not. Can you guess which is which? His reassuring thoughts to himself are that soon he will be able to leave the world of Walmart behind and return to his normal, happy, financially secure life. As he described his fatigue, aching feet and lack of sleep I thought to myself, This is what most of the US consists of – perhaps there needs to be reform?
Speaking of reform, Walmart believes unions are anathema and supports the illegal practice of squashing union talk. On the surface they claim to be open-minded, yet there is a top secret procedure that managers need to follow immediately when they hear talk of organizing. The final chapters of the book describe a hard-fought battle between the retail giant and some employees who wanted to unionize. If most of the book did not depress you, this portion will.
Most of the blurbs that surround this book note that you will never think of Walmart in the same way again. I will say that I wasn’t that surprised at some of the things I learned, except for the way the store demands associates interact with customers. I have never been smiled at or addressed first at my local store – perhaps it is a kinder world in Canada.
Final thoughts – this book is a quick and easily digested read about the class difference and extreme profit seeking of a major corporation. I would have liked if the author followed up in 6 months with his former co-workers to provide a bit more closure to his readers. In any case, it will be interesting to see how/if Walmart responds to the book (despite the fact that it came out a while ago in Canada and was recently translated to English).

The author went undercover to get a "real" view on Walmart and their associates. He shows us how Walmart operates and expects/treats their employees. I must admit, it was a very interesting read and eye-opening. After reading this, I will remember this book when dealing with Walmart associates. Thanks to NetGalley, the author and the publisher for the ARC of this book. Although I received the book in this manner, it did not effect my opinion of this book nor my review.

5 stars
Walmart
Diary of an Associate
byHugo Meunier

This book is enlightening. I have long been leery of how Walmart treats its employees, and Hugo Meunier confirmed all of my misgivings and more! This book is truly a must read for all spectrum's of the economic divide. Blue collar workers will be able to identify with the work, the employees and the ridiculous customer shared within these pages.
I will NEVER step foot in another Walmart again. Any company that will purposely close a profitable store because the associates formed a union is a company to be forever avoided.
This is an extremely well written and powerful book. This book needs to be on every bookshelf, Kindle and phone in the world.

I received a complimentary copy of this book from the publisher and NetGalley. The views given are my own. #Walmart #NetGalley #FernWoodPublishing

I enjoyed reading this short account of what it's like to work at Walmart. The title is totally appropriate. I find it interesting to find out what it's like to work in different work areas/careers, & this fit that bill.... I'm not surprised by anything I read..... probably just re-enforced what I suspected or already knew..... I do think it's a good read for everyone. In all honesty, I didn't find anything in there that would make me refuse to shop at Walmart....
I received an e-ARC from NetGalley & publisher Fernwood, in return for reading & offering my own fair & honest review.

Thanks to NetGalley for an earlier copy of Walmart: Diary of an Associate. I picked this up because I was curious to learn about the interworkings in Walmart. Unfortunately, the title is quite accurate in that it is more of diary of day to day life as an associate. A good portion told of Meunier's day to day tasks and how he was exhausted at the day's end, while working for a pittance. He also focuses a lot on the customer service piece, and how he found Walmart's customers to be rude and demanding. I found it interesting to hear the backstories of Meunier's coworkers and a little about the managerial structure and corporate culture. There was some analysis on the author's part, but not enough for me to consider this an expose or insider's view. It would have also been fascinating to hear about how the story was received, and what interaction he had with associates or Walmart officials after he was discovered to be a reporter.

It should be noted that the edition I reviewed was translated to English. I almost stopped reading at the foreword; the translation was very rough and the background of how Meunier developed this story was quite choppy and hard to follow. After sticking through this, I found the book pleasant overall, but not amazing.

This book was okay. I did like that it was set in my backyard, but I found the author had a weird writing style. It was half straight up research and half anecdotes but somehow, the anecdotes, for the most part, were not detailed enough to make care all that much.

I think this book would have worked better with the author focusing more on the anecdotes and less on the straight out facts. Obviously, we need facts, but they were not well interwoven with the anecdotes.

I also kind of struggled with time periods. It felt as though we were doing a bit of back and forth on the time frame and I could never really figure out exactly what time frame we were in.

Not horrible, but nowhere near as interesting ad Waiting.

"To have a world in common, you have to be able to put yourself in others shoes."



As an inside look at working as an associate for Walmart, Meunier goes under cover to get an in dept look at what it's like to try and live on a minimum wage paycheck. I found the book interesting and I liked the Meunier was willing to get such a first hand account, becoming an employee himself. I liked the personal relationships he formed and made some real human connections throughout his book. But sometimes it felt like he was talking down to working class people (despite coming from that background) like when he states:

"The rallying cry separates the wheat from the chaff; that is the independently minded from the docile employees"


Kinda insulting.

I get that working at Walmart is a culture onto itself, but stand by the man Walmart is already throwing them to the dogs, Meunier don't do the same. I've never worked for the retail giant but I now people who have (worked for Target through!) and this falls inline with things that I've heard about the store and working culture. Especially the anti- union mentality. It's a nice quick read that does open up more about Walmart stores outside of the US. (Even going to Mexico) I'm glad I read it and probably would never want to work there.

Based on investigative journalist Meunier's time undercover at a Montreal Walmart, this is a useful comparison to US based exposés in highlighting the ways in which Walmart in Canada has to evade their more union-friendly laws and workers' rights provisions, although some things, like the asshole customers and the senior citizens camped out in the back booths of the McDonald's drinking coffee are universal.

Not that well-written, it rambles without a great deal of purpose. I was hoping it would become more interesting and have some thoughts by the end, but it just ends without any real points being made.

A journalist goes undercover as a Wal Mart associate in Canada in this account of, to borrow a phrase, the high cost of low prices. Now more than ever, the plight of the minimum wage worker trying to make ends is well known so this book doesn't so much break new ground as reinforce what one should already know. Regardless, this book is well-written and is a quick read.

Fascinating and it sure makes you think. How cheapness affects us, and how we are part of the problem. Interesting take on Wal-Mart.

Thanks to author,publisher and Netgalley for the chance to read this book. While I got this book for free, it had no bearing on the rating I have it.

This was a fast paced book that was easy to digest in just a few short hours. Some of the information was not new. Walmart undercuts some prices to draw people into the store.
One of the surprising things that I learned was that towards the end of the year, near the holidays, is when Walmart will cut back on hours to make MORE PROFIT!
I thought that the author was authentic but I would have wanted more about how people actually live a life working for Walmart then just his aching feet.
Overall a good book, but not a hard hitting journalism story!

A journalists undercover look at Walmart ,gives us a look behind nether scenes how the concept of Walmart really works how the employees are treated their wages responsibilities.The author has an engaging style of writing that and my curiosity drew me in.Not a Walmart shopper and after reading the book don’t plan to be #netgalley#fernwoodpublishing