...the private sector’s main task was to restore business operations in the affected area. Nevertheless, these companies did not tend only to their narrow interests when catastrophe struck. The disaster plans they had in place allowed them to fill broader needs far in advance of the official first responders: “Wal-Mart frequently beat FEMA by days in getting trucks filled with emergency supplies to relief workers and citizens whose lives were upended by the storm. For more than a week, Wal-Mart and a handful of other private enterprises served as the storm-wrecked area’s “only lifeline” to the outside world.
Wal-Mart’s rapid response to Hurricane Katrina was coordinated by its Emergency Operations Center, located near corporate headquarters in Bentonville, Arkansas, and staffed by meteorologists and loss-prevention specialists. Planning began on August 23, six days before the storm made landfall on the Gulf Coast. Based on detailed information about customers’ buying patterns in hurricane-prone areas, Wal-Mart began prepositioning supplies it knew would be in high demand before the storm hit (bottled water, flashlights, batteries, generators, and tarpaulins) and after it hit (mops, chainsaws, and Strawberry Pop-Tarts). Backup generators and dry ice also were deployed to help store managers cope with power outages; teams of roofers were mobilized to deal with building damage; and company employees outside the affected area were alerted to prepare to substitute for locals unable to get to work.Many of these resources were predeployed on both flanks of Katrina’s predicted path in order to increase the chances that no damaged store would be inaccessible.
Besides preparing to deal with the disruption of its own business operations, Wal-Mart delivered $3 million worth of emergency supplies for general distribution in the disaster area after Katrina struck and donated $17 million in cash to the relief effort.
Home Depot began to prepare for Katrina four days in advance of its landfall. All but ten of its thirty-three stores in the affected area were open the next day, and only our remained closed a week later. Like Wal-Mart, Home Depot prepositioned generators and extra workers on both sides of Katrina’s path to ensure a rapid response. FedEx supplies a similar story. Before the storm moved ashore, the company had deployed thirty thousand bags of ice, thirty thousand gallons of water, and eighty-five generators in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, and Tallahassee, Florida, so that it could move quickly to meet its employees’ needs in the disaster area prearranged temporary housing for those workers; and dispatched four self-contained “facility repair kits” to fix any damaged physical assets. FedEx also assisted the Red Cross by prepositioning sixty tons of relief supplies before Katrina hit; after the storm, usually at no charge, it delivered another 440 tons of supplies to the Gulf Coast for that organization. The company’s Kinko’s division predeployed photocopiers, toner
cartridges, and seven hundred cases of paper for use by FEMA and the Red Cross.
Although it is true that private firms “had to get [their] stores open, not evacuate a city”, it is also true that disaster planning and response are only minor, albeit critical components of their organizational functions. In contrast, responding to disaster is FEMA’s only mission. ... Wal-Mart and other companies that donated money and relief supplies to the storm’s survivors undoubtedly expected to benefit financially from the customer goodwill their charity cultivated. Nevertheless, incentives evidently matter.
