Hello, Arkansas
by Michael Schaffer

I’m in Bentonville, Arkansas–home of a little store called Wal-Mart–to give a talk in connection with my book. I don’t actually write a whole lot about the world’s biggest realtor in One Nation Under Dog, though I do note that for all the excitement about ever-healthier lines of organic human-grade puppy meals out there, their Ol’ Roy brand of dog food is still the country’s best seller: Pet food, in its diversity, is a mirror of human food, just as pets are a mirror of America.

Anyway, Wal-Mart, like every other retailer, knows that pets are a big business–I’ve been flown here to share my book’s wisdom on the subject of how we live with pets. But as I read up on the town, I found a slew of articles noting that Northwest Arkansas is one of the fastest-growing sectors of the country, and that the concentration of high-paid executives from some 2,000 firms that sell to the world’s largest retailer has created a market for the sort of upscale goods and services more associated with cosmopolitan coastal big cities. The checklist: Sushi. Aromatherapy. Gucci. And, of course: Doggie day-care.