#awlw

[divalocity]

Stylist❀✿❀Fashion Maven❀✿❀Ogo Offodile

Photography by Christian Vierig

[elvesonstrike]

#FreeTheWalmartElves

Written by a former #Walmart employee, this resonates with #WalmartElves. #AWLW = #WalmartLies

WAL-MART lies to its customers. Okay, so I covered this topic three weeks ago in “The Customer is Number… 2?” but I have a few more anecdotes that are too good to pass up. While at the service desk at on a Wednesday night I received a call from a panicked woman who detected bleach in a gallon of spring water that she had just purchased. Allergic to bleach, the woman had burned her lips and throat when drinking the infected water. She wanted us to test the remaining product and pull it off the shelves if necessary, which I passed along to the CSM on duty, noting that the woman sounded serious. We weren’t going to do that she said, but would tell an assistant manager nonetheless. Sure enough, the woman arrived just before the desk closed at 10 pm with the tainted water as evidence for me to smell (I declined the offer.) As expected the CSM hadn’t done anything with the tip, so we hurriedly ran back to the manager’s office to brief the assistant manager and co-manager who were still in the store. They rejected the seemingly reasonable request of testing the remaining jugs of water out-of-hand. “Tell her management is looking into it” the co-manager said without a trace of humor. And with that they called it a day, leaving me to break the news to the customer and track down a product-liability form since “it’s all we can do.” Back at the desk I parroted the party line while the woman filled out the form, promising to have the water tested on her own. A good idea, I said, knowing WAL-MART surely wasn’t going to do anything about it.

http://workingatwal-mart.blogspot.com/2006/02/liars-and-cheaters.html

[elvesonstrike]

#WalmartElves warn about mean bullies from #AWLW

#WalmartElves are concerned with behavior of Joshua Nicholson and  Brandon Evano from Associates Who Love Walmart. They are trying to sell Walmart friendly apparel to Walmart workers and bully anyone who objects.

Evano protected his Twitter account @brandonevano yesterday after posting the following:

His account is now unprotected and he has included the following in his bio:

I work for the greatest company in the world. I've also saved my money to buy a nice car. Name-callers, spammers, and union trolls shall be blocked.

We WalmartElves @WalmartElvesLOL replied as you can see above.

Joshua's LinkedIn Profile lists his current job as: Assistant Manager at Walmart

http://www.linkedin.com/pub/joshua-nicholson/37/39b/858?trk=pub-pbmap

Brandon is currently a Customer Service Manager at Walmart

http://www.linkedin.com/in/brandonevano

Together they use the internet to complain about Our Walmart and Unions and anyone who does not love Walmart. If their point was simply to share the love of Walmart that many Walmart Associates supposedly feel, their presence would not be so troubling. They are entitled to their opinions, however poisonous they may be,  and to their Facebook communities.

However,  AWLW  does more than try to connect happy Walmart workers.

Not only is Brandon Evano trying to raise money via indiegogo to create AWLW propaganda, Associates Who Love Walmart (run by Brandon Evano) is advertising gear that will be sold to, well, Walmart Associates.

AWLW GEAR NOW AVAILABLE TO PURCHASE! Support your Walmart and wear AWLW with pride! http://awlw.spreadshirt.com/

They advertise these products on their Facebook page too. Apparently, Joshua is planning to buy these products, but they conveniently delete any comments that express criticism or dissent.

#WalmartElves know these are not items the average Walmart Worker can afford or should have to buy to avoid intimidation at Walmart.

indiegogo:

http://www.indiegogo.com/awlw

Hello,

My name is Brandon Evano, and I run and operate the organization, AWLW –Associates Who Love Walmart. AWLW currently has near 12,000 “likes” on Facebook and is continually growing. Unlike the UNION backed group "OurWalmart", AWLW doesn't receive outside funding. As a matter of fact, all expenses that are contributed to AWLW come from my own wallet. 

Let me take a moment to describe to you what AWLW is; AWLW is comprised of thousands of associates who not only love where they work, but love the work that they're doing because they know there is a simple reward in the end - changing the world for the better. Founded in 2011 by Joshua Nicholson, AWLW has grown to reach out to thousands of associates who love working at Walmart. When you work at Walmart, you are not simply joining a company, but a family, and that itself is truly rewarding because when you've got 2.1 million family members pushing you strong, there are no tasks that cannot be achieved. We are the driving force behind changing the world for the better. One community at a time, Walmart associates are making the difference. It's when we pull together that enables us to achieve more and AWLW was founded to help everyone remember that. Worldwide, there are thousands of Walmart associates who are proud of the company Sam Walton built and feel the empowerment and opportunities that this company offers.

Now, AWLW has grown larger than ever before. We’re a very large group of Walmart associates who support our company. My objective and hope is for you to please help me and increase awareness of Walmart associates who disagree with the uprising of unions, and their consistent distortion of how Walmart associates truly feel. There has been continual, one-sided, coverage of Walmart in regards to its treatment of employees and working conditions. It is my intent to make sure that America and the rest of the world can see that 86% of Walmart associates do love their job and are treated with respect and are offered amazing career opportunities.

To do this, I rely on my own personal finances. I create all digital media content for AWLW. From our website, to our Facebook page, all content is genuinely created from my personal time and personal expenses. Unfortunately, I’m not supported by very large organizations, such as the UFCW, which have helped build and support Anti-Walmart propaganda. For this reason, I truly would appreciate ANY support, financially or through word-of-mouth, to help build AWLW into a stronger voice for Walmart associates.

I would also like to make clear, Walmart Stores Inc. is not in any way affiliated with AWLW and does not financially support the organization.

I thank you for your time, and of course, if you would like to learn more about AWLW, please take a moment to visit our website, www.awlw.info and as well as our Facebook, www.facebook.com/welovewalmart and if you wish to contact me directly, feel free to email me at [email protected]

Thank you

We have included a screen shot in case Evano deletes his campaign.

Brandon Evano is known for deleting his Facebook posts and tweets. Earlier on the week of December 9, #WalmartElves noticed Brandon Evano's Facebook profile displayed some photographs of a new Volvo and information about his employment history at Walmart. He has since then changed his privacy settings or removed the images.

Brandon Evano https://www.facebook.com/brandonevano

We were outraged by his request for donations and new car.  We posted the image below on Facebook and Twitter and received much backlash!

Our Caption: "#WalmartElves do not believe Brandon Evano of #AWLW can afford new Volvo on average Walmart wages"

Tags: Free The Walmartelves

An interesting comment was posted beneath our image (the image has since been deleted).

Chad Lower Apparently #WalmartElves can't do math... So the average worker in Pennsylvania makes $12.53 per hour. (http://corporate.walmart.com/our-story/locations/united-states#/united-states/pennsylvania) I will try to make this as simple as possible for you -- the AVERAGE is a measure of the "middle," meaning that there are people who make more, and people who make less. In most businesses, there are fewer managers than non-management employees, and management tends to make more due to the added responsibilities. At the time the purchase was made, it appears Brandon was an Inventory Management System Supervisor according to his facebook page.(https://www.facebook.com/brandonevano/timeline/story?ut=32&wstart=1293868800&wend=1296547199&hash=10150138138593146&pagefilter=3) As a result, I would guess that he made more than $12.52/hr, but I do not know for sure. However, to make things easy, let's assume that he made the average. So $12.53 per hour times 40 hours per week means he earns a little over $500 per week before taxes. Multiply that my 52 (the number of weeks in a year), and he earns roughly $26k per year, or roughly $2170 per average month. I don't know what he paid for his car, but according to his facebook page, he bought a Volvo XC90 (https://www.facebook.com/brandonevano/timeline/story?ut=32&wstart=1330588800&wend=1333263599&hash=10150866734418146&pagefilter=3&ustart=1) in March 2012. Looking at Volvo's website today, you can purchase a 2013 XC90 for $39,700 MSRP. I would guess that a 2012 would cost less than that, and being sold in March, he could have possibly received a better deal than that. But again, for simplicity sake, I will assume that he purchased for $39,700. Volvo's website also has a Payment Estimator (http://www.volvocars.com/us/all-cars/volvo-xc90/tools/pages/paymentestimator.aspx). If he financed the base package through Volvo with no money down, according to Volvo, his payments would be $590/month. If he went with a local bank or credit union, he may have received a better deal. A $590 payment on a $26k wage means the car payment is approximately 27% of his income. According to Bank of America (http://learn.bankofamerica.com/articles/managing-credit/keeping-your-debt-load-manageable.html), "The preferred maximum [debt-to-income ratio] varies from lender to lender, but it's often around 36%." Again, for simplicity case, I am assuming a lot of things I don't believe to be true (his wage, cost of car, no down-payment), but if any of these things work to his favor, then his debt would be smaller than the 27% calculated--still a far cry from the 36% most lenders consider to be the max. (As a point of reference, my wife and I saved and put around $8000 towards a van a few years ago. Savings is not dead.)

Joshua (@TexasGuyinNy) then used Twitter to report accounts with whom he disagreed regarding #AWLW. We can only assume the "personal photos" Joshua Nicholson refers to are a reference to Evano's car in the photograph above, although he did not respond to requests regarding which photos were posted. The photos were on a public Facebook profile.

We posted the following on our Facebook page and were threatened by Joshua Nicholson.

Apparently the "B" Joshua refers to below is "Brandon."

Somehow, Joshua and Brandon remain convinced that the #WalmartElves on Walmart Strike are working with OurWalmart or are harassing Walmart associates on behalf of Unions. 

They deleted all comments WalmartElves made on the AWLW Facebook page, including our inquiry regarding whether Walmart Associates would have to pay for this AWLW gear.

Before:

Now, Free The Walmartelves' comment has been deleted.

Both Twitter accounts @86WalmartElves and @walmart_elves were suspended on the night of December 13-14. This happened while @86WalmartElves were mentioning   @brandonevano (who had blocked them).

Also, a the Twitter account of a young woman @Daisy504 was suspended with no explanation. When her account was restored it displayed disagreements with Nicholson.

Twitter doesn't encourage users to report anyone whose tweets they don't like.

Twitter Help suggests that when dealing with "abusive behavior" users should "Block and ignore"

When you receive unwanted communication from another Twitter user, it is recommend that you block the user and end any communication. Specifically this will prevent that person from following or replying to you. Abusive users often lose interest once they realize that you will not respond. This Twitter Support article shows you how to block other users.

Twitter only removes profiles that are in violation of the Twitter Rules and Terms of Service.  Please remember that Twitter is a communications platform rather than a content provider, we do not mediate disputes between users.

However, both accounts were suspended before a Global Day of Solidarity with Walmart Strikers. @86WalmartElves had to file 2 Twitter Support tickets to have the account restored. This is oddly reminiscent of @WalmartElvesLOL first week on Twitter.

They were suspended twice, despite the fact that they identified as a parody account who were disgusted with Walmart's unsolicited spam tweets. 

The @Walmart Twitter account is not being suspended for what is obviously spam and violation of Twitter rules. Walmart has been paying people some crappy wage to violate Twitter’s rules to tweet to people to try to get them to buy Walmart product. According to Twitter Support, the following behavior is evidence of spam “If you send large numbers of unsolicited @replies or mentions in an attempt to spam a service or link”https://support.twitter.com/articles/18311-the-twitter-rules# Examples of @Walmart tweets with #WalmartElves hashtag that are SPAM https://twitter.com/Walmart/status/274198367502991361 https://twitter.com/Walmart/status/274168581321785346 https://twitter.com/Walmart/status/274128163859206144 Elves don’t exist! Supporters of Walmart Strikers and Walmart Workers are disgusted with Walmart’s marketing campaign. The workers, who deserve a living wage, are not elves.

Our Tweets

Walmart's unsolicited tweets:

All the information below is offered as evidence that Joshua Nicholson and Brandon Evano are not average Walmart Associates. These images were publicly posted on the internet and #WalmartElves are simply posting the info here to spread awareness about the fact that these "Associates" who love Walmart make a lot of money at Walmart and seem to be trying to sell products to hourly associates for either their own profit of Walmart's.

We are not doing anything wrong by sharing information that is already public.

We would like help investigating who will benefit financially from this AWLW campaign.

Pictures of Brandon at Walmart Shareholders' meetings and other fancy Walmart places.

Evano's Blurb Book

We think it's weird that this guy either loves Walmart so much that he wrote a book about it or gets PAID to pretend he loves Walmart.

Finally, we do not know what Core Exports, Arkansas, is, but Nicholson was a CEO there!

These men have bullied Walmart Elves on the internet and are bullying anyone who disagrees with them on the internet, especially on their Facebook page.

Please help WalmartElves stand up to some horrible bullies and do not let them try to punish our own elf friends' Twitter accounts!

Walmart is obviously trying to bully social networking sites to censor those who support Walmart Strike.

Sincerely,

@86WalmartElves

@walmart_elves

@WalmartElvesLOL

@86WalmartElves_

@WalmartElves86