By Tom Stilp, JD, MBA/MM, LLM, MSC, DBA • September 29, 2026
The U.S. has always had huge companies. From Sears and its catalogue that offered many things to many people, to the Walmart stores and Amazon sites that offer now everything, ubiquity is the key. As “your obedient servants” (the 1894 Sears catalogue), retailers serve the “King Customer,” and the King has a voracious appetite.
Following the 1893 Chicago Columbian Exposition, celebrating the discovery of the New World four centuries before, in 1894, Sears offered the public the “Book of Bargains” creating a new world of retailing.
Sears broke down physical and psychological barriers to recognize a new type of consumer, with augmented expectations, improving, if not inventing, new marketing and logistics that paved a path for Walmart and Amazon a century later. Companies grew to gargantuan size.
But can a company get too big? In the past, regulation and antitrust laws were developed by the government to protect consumers from predatory business practices and ensure fair competition, i.e., to avoid monopolies (read here) Dad always said that “competition makes for a better product.” When the market is less competitive, consumers find less options for buying at higher prices.
Logically, big companies would not want to be regulated. Today, however, we have AI companies asking, no, practically begging, to be regulated. Why?
According to economic scholars, one of the reasons may be strategic (Owen & Braeutigam, 1978). Although the main speaking point is that regulation is designed to protect the public, no industry that is given the opportunity to be regulated should reject it because regulation helps eliminate competition, creates barriers to entry for new companies, and allows regulated companies to be served by government, which, in turn, guarantees steady profits to those companies (op. cit).
The big picture here is that there is a growing need to take a closer look at what the regulations are for large companies and how they actually operate. At Stilp Business Law, PC, we have always helped the independent businesses navigate the market, advance their businesses and grow.
REFERENCES
Owen, B. M., & Braeutigam, R. R. (1978). The regulation game: Strategic use of the
administrative process.
