UA business school gets $1 million gift
Wal-Mart Stores Inc.
President and Chief Executive Officer Doug McMillon and his wife, Shelley, signed an agreement earlier this month to give $1 million to the University of Arkansas’ Sam M. Walton College of Business.
The gift will establish a new School of Global Retail Operations & Innovation, the college’s dean, Eli Jones, confirmed Monday.
McMillon was 47 when he took the helm at Wal-Mart in February. He had also served as president and CEO of Sam’s Club.
UA’s business college was renamed for Wal-Mart founder Sam Walton after his family gave a $50 million gift in 1998 to UA through the Walton Family Charitable Support Foundation. At that time, it was the largest donation ever to an American business school.
- Cyd King
Wal-Mart tells China quality on producers
Wal-Mart Stores Inc.
has turned the table on Chinese authorities, telling them that product manufacturers in the country - not the global retailer - are responsible for discrepancies in the quality of products sold at Wal-Mart’s stores in China.
Regulatory entities have fined Wal-Mart nearly $10 million in recent years for problems such as using misleading pricing and selling fox meat as donkey meat. In each case, Wal-Mart said it has done more than required to correct the problem.
In the United States and most other countries, it’s the product-makers that are held accountable for the quality of the products they sell. But in China, “we’re accountable,” Greg Foran, Wal-Mart’s China chief, told The Wall Street Journal.
The Wall Street Journal reported that Chinese authorities try to make an example of foreign companies because their operations are often bigger and names are better known.
Wal-Mart executives have met in recent months with China’s Food and Drug Administration, urging officials to step up their inspections of all food purveyors.
- Cyd King
Arkansas Index rises
2.59 to end 326.71
The Arkansas Index, a price-weighted index that tracks the largest public companies based in the state, gained 2.59 to 326.71 Monday.
Thirteen stocks advanced and four declined.
Three of the four trucking companies led the index.
Shares of J.B. Hunt Transport Services rose 3.9 percent on double its average volume. P.A.M. Transportation Services climbed 2.9 percent in light trading. USA Truck reached a 52-week high during the day before closing up 2 percent.
The index was developed by Bloomberg News and the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette with a base value of 100 as of Dec. 30, 1997.
Business, Pages 25 on 04/15/2014