Wal-Mart Goes Gourmet

"The corporation calls this high-end store on the windy prairieburbs a one-time experiment, a laboratory box store set among the beautiful box stores north of Dallas. 'Please don't think,' the company's U.S. division head, Eduardo Castro-Wright, said in a news release when it opened late last month, 'that this is the direction that we're taking. This is one of the many tests that we're running to understand how to deliver better value to customers.'

But all you can do in here is think -- about life, about taste, about commerce and the little moments where you know they've got your number. The place was designed, Wal-Mart officials have said, to drive women wild, and at the same time appeal to men with a certain retail savvy. It is, as one executive told the press, a Wal-Mart for people who aren't much for yardwork and wouldn't dream of changing their own oil. Instead, you talk to these customers about the $18.64 bottle of EVOO. (Which is foodiespeak for extra-virgin olive oil, which you would know if you were in touch with your inner Rachael Ray.)"