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Founders: #150 Sam Walton (America's Richest Man)

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What I learned from reading Sam Walton: The Inside Story of America's Richest Man by Vance H. Trimble. ---- [3:11] Charlie Munger on Sam Walton: It's quite interesting to think about Walmart starting from a single store in Arkansas – against Sears Roebuck with its name, reputation and all of its billions. How does a guy in Bentonville, Arkansas, with no money, blow right by Sears, Roebuck? And he does it in his own lifetime – in fact, during his own late lifetime because he was already pretty old by the time he started out with one little store. He played the chain store game harder and better than anyone else. Walton invented practically nothing. But he copied everything anybody else ever did that was smart – and he did it with more fanaticism. So he just blew right by them all. [4:46] Sam Walton was no ordinary man. He was a genius in business, with an iron mind —some say pig-headed—unwilling to compromise any of his carefully thought out policies and principles. [5:08] To him, making money was only a game. A test of his imagination and expertise to see how far he could drive a business concept. Wall Street had a hard time getting the drift of that Sam's idea, he readily admitted

[00:00:00] He lives in a simple house in a small southern town. He's been married to the same woman for almost five decades. He drives a Chevy, dresses in store-bought clothes, and puts in long hours at his job. He also made for himself and his family over $9 billion, more than any other man in America. This extraordinary person is Sam Walton, In this fascinating, superbly researched book, Pierce's is carefully cultivated cloak of ordinariness to show what makes him tick and what made him succeed beyond the wildest dreams of wealth. It is a story and a quest that began in the dust bowl of…

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