The man who introduced himself as Jim Wharton mistook Dad for James Yoo and flashed a typical business smile.
“you’re here for James. I’m not James; I’m Seokhun. Jaesung-ah. It seems this gentleman is here to see you.”
Jaesung, who had come out to see the visitor at home, tilted his head at the name Jim Wharton, which sounded familiar from somewhere, then his eyes widened as he looked at the man again.
The man in his mid-40s, who looked like a typical intellectual from the American Midwest, was definitely the Jim Wharton that Jaesung knew.
“Hoo~ From your reaction, it seems you know who I am. Your father doesn’t seem to know, though. This is interesting.”
Noticing Jaesung flinch in surprise, the man grew intrigued, and Dad asked.
“Jaesung-ah, do you know him?”
“If my memory is correct, I believe he’s an executive at Walmart. James K. Wharton, right?”
“You even know my full name. You’re no ordinary kid. I came for business, but I’ve met someone far more interesting than expected.”
They were talking at the front door when Mom appeared and invited him inside, and Jim politely greeted them as he entered the living room.
“What brings an executive from Walmart to our home? I am Seokhun Yoo, a professor at the University of Washington School of Medicine.”
“I apologize for visiting without prior notice. The matter was so urgent that I had to come personally. I am Jim Wharton, in charge of logistics at Walmart.”
The person who visited Jaesung’s home was the youngest son of Sam Walton, Walmart’s founder, and the man who would become Walmart’s third-generation leader in the future.
Currently, his eldest brother Rob Walton had just taken over the CEO position not long ago.
“It’s hard for me to believe as well, but your son has created something quite interesting.”
“Hmm… My son does make many things, but since you’re from Walmart, you’re probably referring to the program he recently supplied to Costco?”
Jim Wharton nodded in agreement.
They had contracted it as an internal secret and tailored the program to Costco’s logistics system, yet Walmart had already obtained the information, and Jim Wharton had come in person.
Walmart is big enough to have informants inside Costco.
In Korea, Walmart entered the market in July 1998, recorded a deficit of 9.9 billion won in 2005, and withdrew in 2006 by selling 16 stores to E-Mart in this world, leaving a hot-bar-like image, but its true nature was a very frightening entity.
Walmart wasn’t the company with the highest market capitalization, but as of 2022, it employed 2.3 million people, making it the world’s No. 1 in employee count, and with annual U.S. sales alone of $572.3 billion (about 760 trillion won), it was the world’s top company in revenue.
For reference, the evil company achieving the second-highest employee count and revenue was the Amazon.com being diligently founded next door by someone who knew nothing about it yet.
“Your son’s program is efficient and drastically reduces the time and manpower required for operations. I heard the program’s price was quite reasonable too.”
Jaesung couldn’t know how a Walmart executive had gotten hands-on with a program used internally at Costco, but with the man in front of him, it seemed entirely possible.
It’s true that Walmart is simply a hypermarket selling daily necessities and various goods, but Jaesung considered the Walton family the true shadow power and ruling class of America.
Walmart, achieving the highest sales in America—the paradise of consumption with countless employees—was like the blood carrying oxygen and nutrients to the massive body that is the United States.
Quietly, but if Walmart set its mind to it, it could exert tremendous influence not only in America but worldwide.
People say the Rothschild family manipulates the world from behind and controls the economy at will, but the truly frightening family is the Waltons.
The world’s wealthiest family wasn’t the Rothschilds or Jewish cartels that frequently appear in conspiracy theories to stimulate public curiosity, but the Walton family from Arkansas, USA.
For a mart selling daily necessities, its market cap exceeds 1,000 trillion won, growing to rank 11th in U.S. market capitalization, larger than JPMorgan Chase.
What’s truly frightening is that the Walton family holds more than half of this giant company Walmart’s shares.
As Jaesung remembered from April 2023, Walton Enterprises LLC, which manages the family’s assets, owns 37.11%, Walt Family Holdings Trust owns 9.11%, the Jim Wharton in front of him owns 3.90%, his sister Alice Walton owns 2.50%, and current CEO Rob Walton owns 1.19%.
They overwhelmingly leave behind the Koch family, the world’s second-richest, to become the undisputed No. 1 family.
Jim, Alice, and Rob, who received divided Walmart shares, rank 17th, 18th, and 19th in the U.S. rich list, enough to realize how wealthy the Walton family is.
But what Jaesung truly found terrifying about the Walton family wasn’t just their enormous financial power, but that they control logistics not only in America but worldwide.
“As you know, we’ve been using satellites for operations since 1987 and investing astronomical amounts in computerizing logistics. In the midst of that, I heard Costco dramatically improved logistics management efficiency with a very small investment, so I came to meet the person named James who created the program. I never imagined it was made by a middle schooler.”
To manage the vast land of America, Walmart had been using satellites since 1987 to track logistics movement in real time.
When satellites proved useful, they launched their own in 1989, and in the future, they would use a total of four satellites to track location and inventory down to the individual item level from pallets.
By actively adopting the latest technology, Walmart’s annual sales, which were $8.4 billion in 1984, grew to $93.6 billion 10 years later, and to $500.3 billion by 2017, another 10 years on.
“Costco only sells about 4,000 types of items, and there aren’t many stores, so the program could be made without much difficulty. But Walmart sells well over 40,000 types of items in stores, and there are too many locations, so managing with the same program would be strained. Plus, you’re using satellite communication systems, so covering security protocols with general coding would be hard.”
Sensing what Jim Wharton wanted, Jaesung felt an ominous premonition and spoke first, saying it would be difficult.
For a low-variety, high-quality membership mart like Costco, adding a few functions they use in the future could improve efficiency, but for Walmart, which is building a logistics empire, it wasn’t a size one person could cover.
If Jaesung started a company, hired employees, and made it properly, it might be possible, but with the body of a 13-year-old attending middle school, creating a program for Walmart was impossible.
“Hoo~! I came out of curiosity from a logistics manager’s perspective about who made such an outstanding program, yet in this moment, you’ve understood Walmart’s system and concluded that the same system as Costco’s can’t be made. If you weren’t a middle schooler, I’d want to scout you right away.”
As Jim Wharton looked at Jaesung with greed flashing in his eyes, goosebumps rose all over his body.
It’s true that Walmart is a global company with enormous sales, but it couldn’t be called a good place to work.
In Korea too, it’s the place with unpaid overtime, weekend, and holiday work that’s disappearing. Even founder Sam Walton wrote in his autobiography that he didn’t care much about employees in the early days, so I absolutely must not get involved!
Walmart had a completely different management philosophy from Costco, which treats employees like family and grows entry-level workers into executives.
Walmart, which absolutely prevents labor unions, even shows propaganda education videos to new employees on ‘why unions are bad and harmful organizations.’
Walmart, which employs most workers not as full-time but only part-time, was famous for harshly exploiting employees.
As Jaesung broke into a cold sweat at Jim Wharton’s words about wanting to scout him, Dad, who had been listening to the conversation, stepped in.
“Thank you for the kind words, but he’s still a young middle school son. Costco is small in scale and we’re familiar since we shop there often, so he could help, but a large company like Walmart seems too burdensome for a child.”
“Oh dear. It seems I’ve made your son nervous. I came with good intentions, so I hope there’s no misunderstanding. Since I visited out of curiosity, if it’s okay, may I look around James’s workspace?”
Jim Wharton, who had great interest in new technologies that reduce labor costs and increase efficiency, wanted to see Jaesung’s work site.
To lighten the mood, they guided him to the garage, and Jaesung recalled feeling strangely tense in front of Jim Wharton.
I’ve dealt with the eccentric Jefferson Bezos and the notoriously ill-tempered Steven Jobs, so there’s no reason to be nervous just because it’s the Walton family.
It was because the other party came unannounced rather than him preparing and visiting, and because he knew the vastness of Walmart’s logistics and was preemptively scared of the grunt work involved, but upon thinking calmly, he didn’t necessarily have to create Walmart’s logistics system.
Walmart, which even launches satellites, naturally has an IT team composed of specialists.
He was flustered by the sudden visit, but thinking carefully, there was no need to be nervous, and instead, a way to utilize the opportunity of Jim Wharton’s visit came to mind.
“Oh! It’s much more professional than I thought. Do you use all this?”
“Yes. My parents bought some, but a few I bought with the money from selling a program to Microsoft.”
Hearing that he sold a personally made program directly to Microsoft, America’s representative software company, Jim Wharton was surprised.
“It’s not supposed to be public yet, but since the features will be included in Windows 95 coming out next year anyway, I’ll show you. But it’s a secret.”
He had already sold the license, and he wasn’t giving the code, so showing the functions wasn’t a problem, but he laid some bait to pique Jim Wharton’s curiosity.
When he showed window hiding, minimizing, maximizing functions, and the menu button, the man was amazed, and he showed even more interest upon hearing these features would appear in Windows 95 next year.
Then, he briefly showed the process of creating the program sold to Costco, confirming that he had made the logistics management system himself.
“I couldn’t believe until just now that you made it, but a genius boy really does exist, I see.”
“There are more middle schoolers who code at that level than you think. I just reconfigured existing programs to make them easier to use. Because my little sister and mom found computers hard to use.”
Computers were still devices for experts, before user-friendly functions like UI or UX for the general public emerged.
Just tweaking difficult and complex programs so beginners could use them quickly was innovative in 1994.
“By any chance, could you make our company’s programs easier to use too?”