so true, which is why I don't set foot in any Walmart and instead order everything off Amazon. Just doing my part.

I saved 13 cents on a mop!

I love my city. You will not find a Starbucks or a Taco Bell or a Walmart or any chain store. Our city council refuses building permits to monolithic chains, allowing local businesses to thrive.

I agree with LCK. Small businesses have character. Our obsession with "convenience" is turning us all into conformist zombies who have no connection to other humans.

I still go to a video store where the staff really knows their inventory. And they will search and order rare stuff for you. It's awesome.

We are giving all our wealth and power to a few people. It's a bad idea.

Well walmart use to, I'm not sure if they still do. When a Walmart was first opened in an area. They would lower their prices beyond their usual prices to make it so no one in the area could compete with them. They would all close up and after the 2yrs they would raise the price back to the usual price.

When I was young and poor, Walmart is all I could afford. My basic needs outweighed my need to uphold some stance on capitalism. Now that I have more money, I can be more selective about which business I purchase from. Don't blame low-income families who need to shop there because of unregulated monopolies and outsourcing for cheap products.

there was a family owned video store in my town. originally their gimmick was pizza to go along with video rentals. Then eventually when everything went digital, they sold their whole inventory, and now they sell pizzas and sandwiches. So they evolved with the times and stayed in business.

Louis always has these great well thought-out, educated takes. Makes me nostalgic for a time I didn't grow up in.

This is what happens when big businesses evade tax and small ones can't.

I grew up in a small town with a mom and pop hardware store and my dad grew up in said and raised his family there. My dad was a Jack of all trades and was constantly in and out buying materials. My father passed away recently of cancer in November at 58. While going through my dad's affairs, my mom went to to pay off my dad's account (which was about $400) at the hardware store. The owner waved her away and told her not to worry about as my dad was such a loyal customer.

A walmart ad preceded my visit to this recording. How F'n nice.

Leave it to Ant to take the side of the greedy corporations and billionaires.

Louis is one of the best comedians of our lifetime. No one likes shopping at Walmart, but when you're not a millionaire you have to try spend the least amount of money. So nice to hear grocery budgeting advice from a rich dude.

It’s fine if you want to say “f my neighbor” and save money at Walmart. But then you don’t get to be upset when you don’t have unique things to buy, and your town lacks visual character. When the cashier is looking at their phone when you talk to them, and treats you like you’re an inconvenience, you only have yourself to blame.

*MASTER DEBATER* The thing with Louis, is he could argue the other side just as effectively in almost any argument and be just as convincing -- just like a master debater.

Target came to Canada and bought out all the Zellers discount stores. One year later Target pulled out now theres 100`s of empty stores where the Zellers once were.

louie's been eating member berries

To be fair, it's not the people's fault. Walmart comes in, gets all kinds of concessions from local governments, and eventually takes over. Plus, their prices are lower. Blaming poor people is simply wrong. People are just trying to survive. I've been in towns all over America where Walmart is literally the only place to get groceries in a 30 mile radius. It's awful, but it's the reality on the ground.

Well, I agree with Louis ck ... people should compromise a little to keep small family businesses.. It's not fair for big corporations to take it all!

I remember my Dad used to take me to this local barber shop called Carmen's named for the old guy who ran it. It's like this building that looks like a house with one of those spinning barber poles in front of the door, and as soon as you step through the door you feel like you're in the old west. Theres this creaky wooden floor as soon as you walk in, and the foyer is about 3x3 with a little staircase leading up into the parlor where they have those old chrome chairs. I used to get these awful bowl cuts there, but they always knew our names, I could watch the old box television up in the corner, Carmen would always talk to my Dad over my shoulder while I was getting my hair cut, and then when I was done he'd crack open the big jar of sweets and give me a lollipop. Carmen died when I was about 10, but I don't think I'd been in for a haircut for a few years by then, because I wanted a "cool" haircut from someplace like supercuts, where you go to a strip mall and they make you wait with some guy who's there to get his tips Re-frosted, and then the disinterested lady cutting your hair pretends to be concerned about how you're doing in school, like they're reading off cue cards and its company practice. Carmen's shop is still there today, it's run by his daughter who's a little older than I am, maybe I'll go in one day.

One of the businesses I miss the most are arcade rooms. Home consoles killed 'em. However, I still have a desire to go to an arcade where I can smoke cigarettes, drink beer, and play Mortal Kombat, Mortal Kombat II, and some Street Fighter II. The problem with any arcade type establishment that ever opens (like a Dave & Busters) is that they try to make it too family oriented. They put in machines for little kids and old ladies, no thought to what guys in their 20's - 50's would actually want to play (the kind of guys who would be regular patrons), it's too well lit, no smoking, too much of a big corporate feel (no regulars, nobody socialises), etc. One of the only mom n' pop type of small business that still thrive are dive bars, because everyday you go in and it's the same people, they all know each other, they're loyal, they can drink and smoke in peace. But they only ever offer pool tables, dart boards, etc. I would open a dive bar that caters to it's regulars, but I would have some classic 90's arcade machines in it and maybe we could have fighting game tournaments or something while we all drink, smoke, and socialise. That's my dream business, and I would keep it small. Of course it will never happen because I'm not successful enough to open a business, but that idea needs to happen. Playing games from home isn't the same as going someplace to play against real people, and having a good time doing it.

Jesus. I always missed this mom and pop VHS/SNES store that my dad would take me and my little brother to rent games and movies in the mid/late 90s but hearing Louie talk about it like that makes me miss it even more so..

make america great again: Vote Louis

the fact he said apple is better than Microsoft made me angry as a developer

member? , yea I member.

One of my favorite moments of Louis on O&A. The other one is where he talks about responsibilities of reasonable parents and their children having to grow up to be functioning, healthy people. Thanks for uploading! :)

We love you Louis! Come back!!!

Are you saying Blockbuster fail because of the people? Not because they refuse to buy Netflix...

What Louie says about small businesses is very important. It's on us.

And this is one of the reasons I support Family Video here in Springfield, Mo. Fuck yeah!

"Once you get the consumer hooked, quality takes a back seat" -Bill Gates

This idea of the fault of consumerism is very interesting. It falls along the same lines of the fault among drug addiction. Walmart is the drug dealer, consumers are the drug addicts...

Whenever I was feeling sad, I'd go hang out in my local used bookstore 💜

Louis CK Rocks one of the Best Stand ups of the last 20 Years IMHO .... Do Another Netflix Show I have rerun all your older stuff to many times

Do these other two guys have to keep laughing hysterically, even when Louis is making a serious point? Ass-kissing laughter is the worst kind.

I would love to support more local businesses, but many of them sell things I don't need or even want. Since I live in a small town, I do know how many of the small businesses operate, and I tend not to approve of their practices. Also, our local bookstore is terrible. There is not one book I want to read there.

Damn louis is insightful as fuck. Cant stop listening to podcasts with him

In my small town I've noticed if a small business opens up Wallmart will try to replace them. A nice vegetable/produce market opened up and a short time later Walmart rearranged their produce section to look like the produce market.

Walmart is so successful because over half the population can't afford "regular priced items" at their local store can afford to sell it at. Middle-class is dead, lower middle-class NEEDS to save those pennies and dimes.

The thing is, it's not 13 cents. sometimes you're looking at way lower prices at the box stores, and times are tight for a lot of people so it makes sense for them. So yeah, blame Walmart, blame Starbuck's. Fuck these monstrosities. Louis shouldn't blame consumers who make way less than he does for wanting to save money. What he should blame them for is consistently voting against their own interests.

Love this one.

positively correct if we the people once again work together and stand together we should be able to keep what we work so hard for, but everyone is so busy trying to do I don't know what.

Half of America literally lives in poverty. No coincidence five members of the Walton family is consistently top 10 wealthiest in the world.

The host's fake laugh puts Jimmy Fallon's to shame

Ck is telling the absolute truth. We as Americans complain about losing jobs to other countries and mom and pop stores closing down but its been the American consumer that vote with their dollars for all of it!

I love how louis doesn't let Opie interrupt him with his useless comments

is it just me or would you rather listen to comedians have real conversations than listen to their standup

Damn every time these guys try to get Loui he simply responds back stronger

I love shopping at the small local stores in town. The people who work there are much friendlier.

South Park covered this topic already. Quite well. Louie made a few new good points though.

Agree with everything except for Microsoft being shit and Apple being superior... no man, just... No..

He ignores basic economic principles that support big business in the country as well as internationally. Things like regulations, the ability to be massive by having a shit ton of capital to deal with. If you look at what happens, during economic times, big business stay while those small businesses are sweep away because they lack capital. I get what he is saying and I think his goal is admirable but his reasons for why small businesses are dying is incorrect.

Man I love Louis CK

I chuckled heartily at the idea of Steve Jobs not being a capitalist.

There is no right answer to the question of "Who's worse, Wal Mart or shitty American consumers?" It's like asking if the chicken or the egg came first. Wal Mart should understand their power as a conglomerate that has the most optimized economies-of-scale in the entire world. They know full and well that when they put their stores into small towns, they are putting dozens of small businesses out of business. They are not stupid, but they know that we as consumers are stupid and want to save money as much as possible, even though service may suck. It's both our fault and Wal Mart's fault so lets all just nuke each other and start over and see if we can do better next time?

Where are all the piano teachers? I'm serious!

Louie CK seems to be a down to earth and kind person. Awesome riff by CK. Fuck Walmart.

Loyalty over convenience

Funny is that Loui says to his daughters, let's lock ourselves inside the house and just put food in our mouths, if you don't have kids I got us covered till we die. Lol. I love him.

Why exactly is this host guy laughing? What Louis is telling here is the story of the end of the American Dream. That's not _funny_. And we have the same mentality here in Europe. You heard the stories about how great bread is in Germany? Like really good stuff, many regional specialities, sold in small family-run bakery shops just around the corner? Just forget about that tale. There are now "back shops" everywhere, run by big chains, because people want to save 10 fucking cents on their fucking tasteless industrial-made bread rolls... _"That's fucking amazing..."_ - yeah right.

"You don't need to save money"- the richest guy in the room

Same thing happened with Starbucks at my local mall several years back. I had a friend who worked at a place called The Coffee Bean, while Starbucks had a small kiosk at the food court. Starbucks eventually opened another location inside the mall, on the opposite end from The Coffee Bean, which forced them to close a few months later. Then Starbucks moved into the vacant location, and closed the two others.

Meeemmmberr??? Oh I memba!

Louis seems to forget places like WalMart thrive in a shit economy...I have no doubt more people would shop 'local' if they could afford it...it's a double-edged sword ...I think it's a shame mom and pop businesses are shutting down, but it's the economy to blame, not so much the 'people'

I sort of agree. I think that the culture of consumerism and individualism itself is the core issue. people have stopped being social and forming relationships with their neighbours and the media perpetuates this mindset of keeping yourself to yourself. as a result, no one is thinking about small businesses, they just see the convenience of buying everything from a superstore - that is more than likely not paying their taxes. we do need to take action and come together, like ck says, but it's not just our fault, it's just that we need to refuse the fear we are fed by media (funded by the 1%) and hopefully change the system for the better. in conclusion: make love not Warcraft

Tbh whenever I have to buy something I try to go through craigslist first. Not just because it's cheaper but just so that I can help another person out and my money doesnt go straight to the store.

and Netflix closed down Blockbuster which I find hilarious.

it happening in craft beer right now.. its a race to the bottom.. who ever sellout first wins...

I miss movie rental places.

Holy Crap!! I do remember the Coffee Connection in HV2! It was an awesome place and their coffee was so much better than Starbucks. The grounds themselves are probably the same, but the way the coffee is prepared is not. I don't ever remember getting a cup of coffee that tasted like it was over-cooked at the Coffee Connection, but it's a routine experience at Starbucks. I once met the original owner of Coffee Connection, George Howell. Great guy and although he never said this to me, I always wondered if Starbucks told him he had 2 choices, sell his business to them and make a lot of money, or, once they moved into the area, try to compete with them while they offered their coffee at prices that would bankrupt him, because they had more funds and could hang in there till he could no longer make a go of it. I'm sure they would have expressed that with more diplomatically phrased statements, but who cares if the poison you're forced to swallow has a good taste? Like I said, he never said that to me and I wouldn't have put him in the position to comment about it, but it it looks like a duck, walks like a duck, and quacks like a duck...it's a freakin' duck.

This seems like a classic case of: There's how things should be, and then there's the way it is. I'm not saying it's right, I'm just saying that's how it is.

um, no. There are no video stores because you are currently watching videos for free on a handheld device.

that was a good one

we've got a small hill town that only advertised its new development in NYC as a summer vacation home.. now theyre petitioning for a walmart and chain restaurants.

microsoft/apple comparison is invalid.

McDonald's coffee is good

i love his point of view!

Did anybody else automatically think "the other is insane" when Louis said "one guy's a genius"?

The problem with Louis's indictment of small town folk fucking over their neighbors is that Walmart has an enormous marketing department that employs professionals that abuse knowledge to further their sales goals and domination of the local market. They design and scheme ways to compel you to shop with them, they manipulate numbers just enough to get you to go into their shop over your neighbor's. Lesser educated or innocent small town folk are going to fall prey to these psychological techniques. Walmart is fully to blame for what they do knowingly. Marketing industry taking advantage of psychology is a huge problem and is quite sinister. edit: TL;DR Walmart is the vampire that persuades you to invite it into your home (occupies your brain space)

Ant is the oldest guy in the room, yet he's the one pushing for technology to overtake "old fashioned" mom & pop stores. Even if he agreed with what Louis was saying, he probably wouldn't admit it. At 58, he's so afraid of seeming old, that he's constantly pushing for newer, younger, better, faster. Not to mention that he dates girls that were born in the last few years so he's got to keep up with whatever the young, hip thing is. Lol

VHS vs Betamax was more than just cut throat business marketing. It was a cost of production, weight of shipping, so much more than just me vs you.

Love how Louie shits all over these predatory businesses and then when Opie shits on Starbucks he goes "it's ok" LOL 6:18

That's why ingenuity thrives... Learn how to adapt. Blockbusters had the money and resources to change. Amazon came online in 1994. Netflix in 1997. If they had anyone in charge to see there was a change coming, blockbuster could have easily been a hybrid of Netflix/Redbox right now. Same goes for Borders and Barnes & Nobel. You have to learn to change with the times.

Louis - weren't you pro Clinton? You know she was on the board of Walmart? Well. Okay.

For those who don't know movies and TV shows are STILL being stored and transported via Beta tapes in the post production world.

I always found it funny when they say, support your local business...let's take his mop example, a Ma & Pa shop doesn't actually make it either, why should I go there and have them charge me like $3-4 more because of their costs just so I can keep them in business? Wal-Mart equally pays taxes, and employees (usually has more local employees than a small store too ) and maybe in a small town the service is better but a large city and the only advantage that store has is how convenient it is. Another example is a neighborhood store, sells all the same quick food products (milk, bread etc ) as a larger store but it usually costs twice as much or at least 1.5x more...those owners just buy that shit from Costco like everyone else and then charge more just to justify a price increase? bottom line is usually how lazy some people are to either go buy that exact same product somewhere else for cheaper or suck it up and pay more at the moment to have it right away. Just like Amazon

Microsoft is shitty OS? You kidding me bruh? Apple is an overpriced piece of shit as far as im concenred. :P

actually, vhs won because the porn industry chose it. same thing with dvd. porn hold a huge impact on us

Lol the ad that played b4 this video was for support small business day when I tapped it

Yeah, but you're going to pay a lot more than 13 cents a mop at Mom & Pop's store. I have my own family to think about. If I can cut my costs in half or more by going to Walmart instead of someone's small business, c-ya Ma' & Pa'.

So I might have been able to develop social skills if only I were born before this corporate conspiracy happened? Fuck. Bad timing.

easy for Louis to say hes worth 50 million dollars. there is no middle class in this country anymore, people need to save a dollar here and a dollar there now.

The most aggravating thing about the big box stores is that ~everything is a half-assed substitute for what I really need. :(P

brilliant

Worship corporations because they have no souls and can get what you want instantly until they are eaten by the bigger predator... Yip Human existence.

We're not talking 13 cents on a mop. Part of it was price...and a significant price drop. Instead of a family spending $150 they would spend $100 and they could do it all in one place. It's the difference between a family eating Kraft Dinner and being able to afford some boneless, skinless chicken. Since the US spent billions of dollars waging war instead of innovation over the last 20 years there are no replacement industries for dirty energy and old manufacturing that other countries are willing to do for much lower wages. You can't "bring those jobs back" like Trump says. Say you do bring those jobs back and sink nation after nation including Mexico into poverty you wouldn't like the result. Desperate people in Mexico will start working for the cartels once Trump's green monster goes up and there will be an influx of cocaine and bloodshed. The North American workforce needs to have skills the rest of the world doesn't have. When Europe was putting itself back together the USA flourished because our workforce had roads to travel on, basic health and education. Our kids were supposed to be better educated and what happened? The education system is in the stone ages. Obama's massive investment in new manufacturing is years away. A conservative economic principle that Trump ignores is that NEW technology creates a stable middle class, not old technology. How the fuck can new technology be created when half of the country doesn't believe in evolution? BASIC science. One thing Trump does have right is that the USA used to take the best and brightest from around the globe and educate them. After getting their degrees those best and brightest would stay in America. Now they leave and go back home. So sorry Louis CK, people supporting their local Mom & Pop store instead of WalMart would have made no difference.

I listen to these while working in the deli/bakery section of a Walmart supermarket Lol

When they started comparing computer software they lost me. Especially considering what Apple does to their customers, two, three times the price, proprietary everything. It contradicts everything they said earlier.