"Having pledged ourselves, we encountered the aspect of Wal-Mart employment that impressed me most: The Telxon, ... a hand-held bar-code scanner with a wireless connection to the store's computer. When pointed at any product, the Telxon would reveal ... the quantity that should be on the shelf, the availability from the nearest warehouse, the retail price, and (most amazing of all) the markup. All of us were given access to this information, because - in theory, at least - anyone in the store could order a couple extra pallets of anything, and could discount it heavily as a Volume Producing Item (known as a VPI), competing with other departments to rack up the most profitable sales each month." - Casey Muller