I'm not a snob. Truly, I am not. But no matter how hard I try, I just can't bring myself to do certain things like dine at an all you can eat restaurant, fly Southwest Airlines across the country, drink Pabst Blue Ribbon beer, wear a track suit in public or SHOP AT WALMART! I know they spent a fortune to rebrand their look, freshen up the stores and try to appeal to a softer, more gentle crowd. Well, that crowd is far from "soft and gentle" and I've been in many, many walmart's around this lovely country. Every time I walk into one I feel like I'm going to be robbed, beat up or dismembered. OK, maybe I'm being a little dramatic, but if you have an opportunity to visit both a walmart AND a Target in the same day, get back to me on your thoughts about the cleanliness, the employees and the clientele. That said, I have been blown away by a few things I've found at walmart. That means, you guessed it, that I've been shopping at hell-mart recently. I love to pop into antiques stores of every kind looking for great deals and, on occasion, I'll stroll the aisles of hell-mart looking for hidden treasure. Two years ago, for example, I found great stock pots made by LODGE cookware, so I snapped one up for Joe for $45 and he uses it almost every night. This weeks experience with the big W was a surprisingly lovely one. Well, strike that. I headed into a store about thirty miles north of us and immediately turned around when I smelled vomit and could see the lines were longer than security at JFK. I headed home, logged onto walmart.com and was pleased to land on my greatest new find. Once you create an online profile with the walmart.com/photo department (takes about five minutes), you can upload and order photos for either one hour, same day or next day pick-ups at no extra charge. To test this service from keyboard to in-store checkout, I ordered an 11x14 poster. I clicked the option to "text" me when the order was ready and, low and behold, an hour later I received a text from walmart, drove to our nearest store and for $5.99 and NO HASSLE at all, I had a fantastic poster and snapped up a snazzy frame on my way out for $5! For a client with an amazing photo collection, I've suggested we scan them, upload them to the walmart/photo site and create canvases (shown above) for a unique, inexpensive alternative to framing. An 11x14 canvas is only $19.96 and 16x20 is $29.96. Imagine your hallway with various sized canvases showing off your holidays, family gatherings and other favorite photos? Alert the media, I think I'm in love with a little mart called Wal!
TIME TO COMPLETE TASK: Two hours from download to pick-up
COST: $19.96 for a canvas version of my favorite photo
STRESS LEVEL: Finding creative ideas for cheap, cheap, cheap..LOW
