Hello everyone!

I was surfing the 'net and found a possible explanation to why Wal-Mart has been having so much trouble lately. I am at Wally World a lot as you know and I have noticed something was different but couldn't put my hand on it. Comments out there?

Wal-Mart theft: $3 billion a year?

Wal-Mart declined to offer any explanations for the rise in losses but denied it has cut security staff and said employee morale is rising rather than falling.

Although Wal-Mart declined to reveal any details, analysts suspect Wal-Mart -- which for years had a theft loss rate that was half that of its peers -- is getting closer to the industrywide average.

Theft is a big problem for all retailers, costing them $41.6 billion last year, according to a joint study released this week by the National Retail Federation and the University of Florida. The study found that the theft rate as a percentage of sales ticked upward slightly to 1.61% of sales in 2006 from 1.60% in 2005.

A profit killer

Eduardo Castro-Wright, president and CEO of Wal-Mart's U.S. store division, briefly acknowledged the theft problem in a mid-May conference call with analysts. He cited shrinkage as well as increased markdowns and higher inventory for dragging down first-quarter profit margins.

"We are concerned about shrinkage and are investigating the cause and are taking steps to correct it," Castro-Wright said. Company officials won't comment on those countermeasures. The company also said in a June 1 filing with federal securities regulators that its gross profit margin fell by 0.1% in the first quarter due in part to "higher inventory shrinkage."

John Simley, a Wal-Mart spokesman, declined to elaborate. He would say only that the company's theft losses as a percentage of sales is "better than our industry peer groups."

Analysts say it's significant that the company has publicly disclosed that theft is becoming a problem. "It is getting to the point of being material," said Richard Hastings, vice president and senior retail sector analyst at Bernard Sands. Securities regulations require companies to alert shareholders to significant corporate developments that could affect the value of their holdings.

$45,000 from the store safe

Such pilferage as a percentage of sales has been declining since the mid-1990s as retailers have invested in new technology, such as closed-circuit TVs, according to Richard Hollinger, professor of criminology at the University of Florida.

About 47% of the dollars lost came from employee theft, while shoplifting accounted for about 32%, according to the National Retail Federation report. Administrative errors account for 14%, while supplier fraud accounts for 4%. The remaining 3% is unaccounted for.

In one of the more brazen employee thefts, a man wearing dark clothing and a ski mask entered a Port Clinton, Ohio, Wal-Mart store in January at midnight unnoticed by employees and stole $45,000 from the store safe. The store's night manager, Dana Walker, 30, was later arrested for the crime. He became a suspect because he knew the combination to the safe, police said.

The company's vociferous critic WakeUpWalMart.com, funded by the United Food and Commercial Workers, which has for years tried to organize the retailer's workers, publicized the company's decision last year to relax its zero-tolerance policy on shoplifting. The new policy seeks prosecutions of first-time offenders only if they are between ages 18 to 65 and steal at least $25 worth of merchandise.

That change may have emboldened some folks to shoplift, said Mark Doyle, president of Jack L. Hayes International, a retail consultancy on loss prevention.

WakeUpWalMart.com and some former employees said Wal-Mart may also have been trying to appease complaints by some police departments that its stores tied up police with too many shoplifting calls. Wal-Mart has denied that.

Wal-Mart also may have been spooked by worries about lawsuits from wrongful death, unlawful imprisonment and other legal issues related to aggressively chasing down shoplifters. In March, Wal-Mart agreed to pay $750,000 to the family of a suspected shoplifter who suffocated to death in 2005 as loss prevention workers held him down in a parking lot outside a store in Atascocita, Texas.

'Being run by bean counters'

The change in policy came at the same time the company began using more part-time workers -- in part because of a new scheduling system that matches staffing more closely to peak shopping hours -- and shifting security personnel, analysts and critics say. That has left the discount chain without an experienced and loyal staff to monitor what's strolling out its back and front doors, analysts and some former employees supplied by WakeUpWalMart.com said.

"The business is being run by bean counters. I am shocked at the Spartan level of staffing," said Flickinger, managing director of Strategic Resources Group. He added, "There are also morale issues. Workers feel that the company is taking care of itself."

While Wal-Mart denies that it has cut anti-theft jobs overall, it says it has adjusted staffing to put more personnel in stores in high-crime areas and fewer in stores with less trouble.

Skimpy pay and benefits

However, Dan Meyer, a former district loss prevention supervisor for several Wal-Mart stores in New Jersey, disputes that. Meyer, who said he accepted a buyout last fall after almost 12 years with the company, said Wal-Mart reduced the number of loss prevention staff in each store last year and redesigned their jobs in a way that was less active and more administrative.

"That's why shrinkage is up," he said.

Meyer said he averaged 13 apprehensions a month during most of his time at Wal-Mart. That number dropped to three to four a month in the months before he left last October. Meyer said his totals dropped because there were fewer security staff and less support from his managers for aggressively rooting out theft.

WakeUpWalMart.com has linked rising theft to its claims that the company offers skimpy pay and benefits. Wal-Mart also faces a class-action lawsuit alleging female workers were passed over for men in pay and promotions.

"I am not the type to steal, but because we are so mistreated, when I saw things I just didn't do anything," said Gina Tuley, a former Wal-Mart bakery worker, who quit her job at the Seagoville, Texas, store in March. A big complaint was that her hours had been cut, reducing her take-home pay.

Wal-Mart defends its pay as competitive and its health-care coverage as better than most retailers, and has denied gender discrimination.

Wal-Mart's Simley said an April survey of employees that showed rising job satisfaction suggests Tuley's attitude does not represent most Wal-Mart associates.

Even so, several former associates said in interviews that their bonuses have declined because of the rise in inventory losses.

The shrinking bonus

Wal-Mart's Simley disputes these claims, saying theft reduction was dropped from the bonus formula about a dozen years ago. It was Walton's idea to tie associates' bonuses to their stores' pilferage levels to give them a vested interest in keeping theft in check. Tuley said her bonus last year was $300, down from $800 the previous year.

"People would walk out with bags of merchandise. . . . I heard the alarms go off, and people wouldn't even look," she said.

Hello everyone!

Well, I found the explanation of what he was thinking so maybe this will help but I like my ideas better. Where is everyone?

© HBO

'The Sopranos'

'Sopranos' Creator: Movie No Sure Thing
Jun 12, 7:20 AM EST

The Associated Press

NEWARK, N.J. -- "Sopranos" fans who thought the series' open-ended conclusion was a setup for a movie may be in for disappointment: creator David Chase says it isn't so.

Chase said he would leave it to fans to interpret the show's last scene for themselves. It featured the members of the Soprano family arriving for dinner as Journey's "Don't Stop Believin'" plays. Others in the restaurant include a man in a Member's Only jacket who goes to the bathroom, which some fans have interpreted as a nod to the scene in "The Godfather" in which Michael Corleone retrieves a gun from the bathroom before a shooting.

Chase went to France before the airing of the much-debated finale of the HBO series because he wanted to avoid what he called "all the Monday morning quarterbacking." But like a true New Jersey loyalist, he granted one interview to The Star-Ledger of Newark, which posted his comment early Tuesday on its Web site.

"I don't think about (a movie) much," he told the paper. "I never say never. An idea could pop into my head where I would go, `Wow, that would make a great movie,' but I doubt it.

"I'm not being coy," he added. "If something appeared that really made a good `Sopranos' movie and you could invest in it and everybody else wanted to do it, I would do it. But I think we've kind of said it and done it."

"I have no interest in explaining, defending, reinterpreting, or adding to what is there," said Chase, 61, who grew up in North Caldwell.

"People get the impression that you're trying to (mess) with them, and it's not true. You're trying to entertain them," he said. "Anybody who wants to watch it, it's all there."

Another problem with a movie is that so many characters died in the last season. Chase said he has considered "going back to a day in 2006 that you didn't see, but then (Tony's children) would be older than they were then and you would know that Tony doesn't get killed.

"I don't think about (a movie) much," he told the paper. "I never say never. An idea could pop into my head where I would go, `Wow, that would make a great movie,' but I doubt it.

"I'm not being coy," he added. "If something appeared that really made a good `Sopranos' movie and you could invest in it and everybody else wanted to do it, I would do it. But I think we've kind of said it and done it."

Chase said he would leave it to fans to interpret the show's last scene for themselves. It featured the members of the Soprano family arriving for dinner as Journey's "Don't Stop Believin'" plays. Others in the restaurant include a man in a Member's Only jacket who goes to the bathroom, which some fans have interpreted as a nod to the scene in "The Godfather" in which Michael Corleone retrieves a gun from the bathroom before a shooting.

As the music and tension build, the screen suddenly goes silent and dark.

"I have no interest in explaining, defending, reinterpreting, or adding to what is there," said Chase, 61, who grew up in North Caldwell.

"People get the impression that you're trying to (mess) with them, and it's not true. You're trying to entertain them," he said. "Anybody who wants to watch it, it's all there."

Another problem with a movie is that so many characters died in the last season. Chase said he has considered "going back to a day in 2006 that you didn't see, but then (Tony's children) would be older than they were then and you would know that Tony doesn't get killed.

It's got problems."

Chase also elaborated on how he decided to make the Journey classic the last music played on the series.

"It didn't take much time at all to pick it, but there was a lot of conversation after the fact. I did something I'd never done before: In the location van, with the crew, I was saying, `What do you think?' When I said, `Don't Stop Believin',' people went, `What? Oh my God!'

"I said, `I know, I know, just give a listen,' and little by little, people started coming around."

HOLLYWOOD, Fla. (AP) -- Hey, you got a problem with how "The Sopranos" wound up? Take it up with  Christopher, if you dare.

"I think it's a great ending. It's a good way to go out," said Michael Imperioli, who played Tony's nephew, until he got whacked this season.

Imperioli and  fellow cast members told reporters they were pleased with the finale as they walked the red carpet at the Seminole Hard Rock Hotel and Casino on Sunday.

"We're all heartbroken. We could go on forever. Me and Edie Falco wanna die on the set," Tony Sirico said, sporting his character Paulie's trademark silver wings.

The characteristically shy  James Gandolfini, who played New Jersey mob boss Tony, was mum on his thoughts on the ending. He sported a beard and sunglasses and was sweating in the muggy South Florida weather as he smiled and waved to the large crowd of fans that gathered for his send-off.

Lorraine Bracco's character, Dr. Jennifer Melfi, didn't appear in the series finale. Melfi abruptly terminated Tony's therapy in last week's episode.

"She ended a strong confident woman and I loved that," Bracco said at the cast party.

Steven Van Zandt, who played Tony's consigliere Sil, said cryptically of the finale, "We're not sure it's ending."

Series creator David Chase's dangling ending seems primed for the big screen. Although there's been no serious talk of making a film, "a couple of years from now, who knows?" Van Zandt said.

Arthur Nascarella, who played Carlo on the show, also didn't rule out the possibility of a future for the show.

"Wait three years and get back to me," Nascarella said.

Okay, for those of you who are curious, I would have ended the show this way (and they could still do it for the big screen are you listening out there David Chase?)

After the big hype dies down and they shoot a new movie to wrap up all of the loose ends that couldn't possibly be done in a hour episode, I would have Tony talking to Uncle Junior in an old folk's home. Tony's mom would have died like in the series and Tony, Carmella and the kids will be living in a house just like (or even the actual one) that his mom lived in. Tony is a plumber, Carmella is a PTA mom and the kids are pretty much the same but they have regular friends with regular problems. Uncle Junior and Tony are catching up with life and that's when it's revealed that Uncle Junior is a great storyteller and Meadow becomes another great writer/director. The movie ends with Meadow on the set shooting this great movie called the Sopranos. Great twist that would work with either everybody who was on the show to have a career for as long as they wanted or start over with a new cast.

I am seriously thinking of sending my idea to David Chase so please don't steal my idea but I would love your comments!

It may have been the greatest double-take -- by the audience -- in the history of American television.

Millions of viewers who might have thought something had gone wrong with their TV sets or cable systems last night were mistaken. When the picture vanished at the end, the very end, of "The Sopranos" and the screen went black, that was producer David Chase's unorthodox and arguably ingenious way of ending the series and dispatching the Soprano family to eternity.

Chase set up the audience to expect an assassination, perhaps of the whole Soprano family: Tony, Carmela, Anthony Jr. and Meadow, who were sitting in a nostalgically old-fashioned diner about to order dinner. Menacing strangers entered. One went into the men's room, a seeming reference to a famous shooting in "The Godfather" in which a gun was hidden in a water closet.

And then -- while Journey's "Don't Stop Believing" played on a vintage jukebox and the family members made everyday small talk -- the Sopranos disappeared. No shots were fired. Whether they all would have been killed in the next scene, or lived several more years, or even made it to old age, was not specified.

These great mythic characters, who have captivated HBO viewers for nearly a decade, are now suspended in space and the national imagination forever.

An attentive HBO executive who was watching the episode for the second time said the last image, of Tony's face, was seen just as the words "don't stop" were sung on the jukebox. The episode was littered with references to mortality -- life, death, even the Apocalypse in a poem by William Butler Yeats. Only Chase could mix Yeats with the theme from "The Twilight Zone" and Simon & Garfunkel's "Cecilia" played as a cellphone chime and make it all jell.

As always, "The Sopranos" was a catalogue of references from the mundane to the profound, but the finale was the biggest guessing game of all: Who would die, who would live? Fans of the show hoping to see the evil Phil Leotardo get his saw one of the grisliest deaths in the series:

After being shot in the head, Leotardo falls dead to a gas station driveway. The SUV from which he'd emerged proceeds to run over his skull, crushing it and causing his two little grandchildren in their car seats to feel a little bump. It was macabre and bizarre in a way that only "Sopranos" could bring off.

Throughout the episode, Chase paid farewell visits to many of the regular "Sopranos" haunts, including the Bada Bing Club ("the Bing" to its mob owners), Satriale's Pork Store, and the Soprano home once the family felt safe enough to move out of hiding and back into it. In the end, Tony's problem with the feuding mob boss Leotardo was solved with the help of an FBI agent, who could in his way have been as morally corrupt as Tony in his.

But "The Sopranos" was not judgmental. It could be maddeningly neutral and even amoral; Tony Soprano, so powerfully played by James Gandolfini, could be a vicious killer one moment and dear old daddy the next. He loomed a giant figure from the first episode to last night's blistering and shattering finale.

Even posthumous characters showed up or were mentioned last night. Tony's malicious mother is still in his thoughts: "I never could please my mother," Tony said sorrowfully to his son's new therapist. Tony's own therapist, in an unlikely turn of events, dropped him as a patient last week, but now Tony's very, very confused son is seeking a shrink of his own. So the torch is passed to a new generation.

At a mental hospital, Tony visited the notorious old Uncle Junior, who was once instructed by Tony's own mother to kill him and later, in the throes of dotage and Alzheimer's, shot Tony in the stomach. Uncle Junior, dazed and deluded, exists somewhere between the living and the dead.

And Tony's nephew Christopher, whose life Tony himself ended in a recent episode, returned as a photo on the wall that a stray cat for some reason stared at obsessively -- even when the photo was moved to another spot.

HBO has had greater success with "The Sopranos" than any premium cable network has ever had with any series -- not just in terms of audience size but in terms of inspiring conversations, arguments, discussions and re-viewings of episodes.

Wherever two or three are gathered around a water cooler this morning, "The Sopranos" is likely to be a subject of discussion.

It's a classic now, and one that will live on for years.

In a few years, it could be just as common for a Wal-Mart shopper to head to the retailer for an allergy shot or a strep-throat test as it is to swing by for food or clothes.

After a pilot program, Wal-Mart Stores (WMT, news, msgs) has announced plans to open as many as 400 in-store health clinics in the next two to three years. That number could jump to 2,000 in five to seven years if current conditions persist.

With Wal-Mart facing sluggish U.S. sales growth, analysts said the clinics give the retailer a means to improve sales by keeping its base of lower-income shoppers in its stores longer and keeping them out of costly emergency rooms.

"The health-care crisis and the inflation associated with it creates a lot of problems for their customers," said Richard Hastings, senior retail analyst at Bernard Sands. "They (Wal-Mart) are extremely exposed to the lower-income population's economic woes."

An estimated 46 million Americans lack health insurance, and, according to the National Coalition on Health Care, health-care spending constitutes about 16% of the U.S. economy.

With Americans trying to find cheaper health-care alternatives, Wal-Mart began testing in-store health clinics in September 2005, and it now has 76 clinics.

The retailer does not operate the clinics. Instead, it leases in-store space to outside operators. The clinics provide basic preventive and health services -- like cholesterol screenings or treatment for sore throats.

Squeezed by gas prices, housing bust

A routine visit costs $40 to $65, excluding insurance. That is less than a similar visit to a primary-care physician, which could run between $80 and $110, excluding insurance, while an emergency room visit could be at least $250, said Alicia Ledlie, senior director of Wal-Mart's health business development.

Ledlie said its in-store clinic operators found that more than half of the customers who used the clinics said they had no health insurance, and nearly 15% said they would have gone to an emergency room if the clinic was not there.

That was the hypothesis, but to see that proven out in the data really, to us, felt like this was the right time to go forward in a bigger way," Ledlie said.

Hastings said keeping customers out of emergency rooms makes sense for Wal-Mart, whose lower-income shoppers are being squeezed by high gasoline prices and a slowing housing market. An unexpected emergency room trip could drain a shopper of dollars that would otherwise be spent at Wal-Mart, he said.

'1-stop shopping'

Ledlie said the clinics fit the idea of "one-stop shopping" -- a customer who has been treated for a sore throat can then fill a prescription at a Wal-Mart pharmacy and buy everything from chicken soup to cough drops before leaving.

"There's a number of health and wellness solutions throughout the store. How do we make sure customers are aware of them?" Ledlie said of the challenge Wal-Mart faces.

Hastings said incremental sales are crucial to Wal-Mart, where margins are compressed by the emphasis on low prices.

"It's all about conversion and marginal sales," he said. "Marginal sales are the backbone of the Wal-Mart system."

But Wal-Mart is not the only retailer pursuing clinics.

CVS/Caremark (CVS, news, msgs) is adding hundreds of Minute Clinic locations this year, and Walgreen (WAG, news, msgs) has said it plans to have 250 health clinics operating in its drugstores by the end of August.

Standard & Poor's equity analyst Joseph Agnese said he favors having the clinics in drugstores because a Wal-Mart supercenter may be difficult to get to or be surrounded by a sprawling parking lot.

"If you are sick, you are going to choose the most convenient location," he said.

But Ledlie counters that argument, saying the top reason users cite for visiting a Wal-Mart clinic is convenience. Oppenheimer retail analyst Bernard Sosnick said Wal-Mart's success with its $4 generic prescription drug program could point to success with the clinics.

Wal-Mart began selling certain generic drugs for $4 per monthly prescription in September and by the end of November had extended the program to all of its pharmacies -- far ahead of schedule.

Sosnick said Wal-Mart could theoretically lease space to clinics at attractive rates so prices could remain low, but it would make up for the lower rent by increasing sales at its pharmacies or other departments.

Analysts said in-store health clinics are not necessarily an either/or proposition -- either they succeed at Wal-Mart or they succeed at drugstores.

"It's a big market, and there will be a place for each," Sosnick said.

Instead, analysts see Wal-Mart clinics mainly as an attempt by the retailer to sell more to its own customers over time.

"It should be accretive in three to five years," Hastings said. "This is an extremely long process."

Goodwill worker gets to keep pajamas jackpot

21-year-old single mother of three found $5,000 in donated clothes

GREENVILLE, S.C. - A Goodwill Industries worker who turned in more than $5,000 she found in donated pajama pants will get to keep the money because the owner could not be found.

Kelli Owens, a 21-year-old single mother of three, was sorting donated clothes as part of her training at Goodwill earlier this month when she found the money. She took it straight to her supervisor.

“She will get to keep the money,” Goodwill spokeswoman Crystal Hardesty said Friday. “It’s being invested into a scholarship fund.”

‘I just want everybody to be proud of me’
Owens plans to go to Greenville Technical College to pursue a career in law enforcement.

“I just want everybody to be proud of me — knowing that there is someone out there that is honest,” Owens told WYFF-TV on Thursday. “I couldn’t keep it because it belonged to somebody else, you know. I couldn’t live with myself knowing that.”

The money was in an envelope with a note naming the intended recipient. The giver wrote that he or she hoped the money would be spent wisely.

Goodwill officials talked to more than 30 people, but none could give the right description, the name on the letter or where the donation was dropped off.

“We feel like we vetted it very well,” Hardesty said. “The story got a lot of publicity.”

Hello everyone!

When I saw this on the 'net this morning, that was my first thought; I wish it had happened to us so I could see beloved everyday!

Lottery winner vows to finish auto-repair jobs

Hard-working N.M. man who hit $62.8 million jackpot will then retire

ALBUQUERQUE, N.M — Felipe Pina of Los Ojos, N.M., plans to spend a couple of weeks finishing up the work left in his auto repair shop in Chama, then he's going to close it and retire.

Pina, 57, came forward Wednesday to claim the $62.8 million Powerball jackpot sold May 23. The New Mexico Lottery announced last week that the winning ticket had been sold in the state and recommended the then-unidentified winner seek legal and financial advice before turning it in.

Pina said, however, that in the rural part of northern New Mexico where he lives, it didn't take long before everyone knew. 

Pina, who declined to answer personal questions about his family or business, said he buys a lottery ticket before the Powerball drawings every Wednesday and Saturday, usually at the same place that sold him the winning ticket, the Giant Sundial gasoline station in Chama.

And he put this ticket where he always puts his lottery tickets — in his cup holder.

After hearing the winner was from New Mexico, he checked the ticket last Thursday after leaving the shop he's operated for 21 years — Pina Truck and Auto Repair.

"I laughed. I looked at it about three times," Pina said. "I put my reading glasses on."

Girlfriend gets the news
Then he went home to his girlfriend, asked her if she believed in miracles and told her, "I just hit the Powerball."

His life, he said, will be different because he'll have "millions compared to thousands."

Pina said he hasn't spent any of the winnings yet, but he'd like to buy a nice car, a nice house, pay bills, help his son Phillip Arthur with a college education "and maybe hit all 16 Oakland Raiders games."

Eventually, he said, he might open another shop, this one to fix up classic cars. He already owns a '64 Ford Falcon Sprint and he'd like a '55 Chevy to fix up.

He wouldn't say whether he intends to take the nearly $30 million cash payout or an annuity that would pay the full $62.8 million over 30 years. Lottery officials said taxes will take about 31 percent.

Pina becomes New Mexico's fourth Powerball winner. A group of employees at Sandia National Laboratories in Albuquerque claimed a $131 million Powerball jackpot in November 2000; Isabell Delgado of Las Cruces claimed a $32 million jackpot in February 2002; and John San Cartier, an airman from Kirtland Air Force Base in Albuquerque, won a $93.4 million Powerball in August 2005.