Walmart is the world's largest corporation by revenue. The first store open on 2nd July 1962 in Arkansas. Within five years the company had expanded to stores across the state and reached $12.6bn in sales. By 1968 the first store outside Arkansas had been open in Oklahoma.
By its 25th anniversary in 1987 there were 1,198 stores with sales of $15.9 billion and 200,000 employees.
In 2005, Wal-Mart had $312.4 billion in sales, more than 6,200 facilities around the world—including 3,800 stores in the United States and 2,800 elsewhere, employing more than 1.6 million workers worldwide. Its U.S. presence grew so rapidly that only small pockets of the country remained further than 60 miles (100 km) from the nearest Wal-Mart.
Click this link just to see how Walmart spread across the United States like wild fire... it starts slow and then just explodes! Quite amazing.
http://projects.flowingdata.com/walmart/
Labels: James G