If banks weren’t in enough trouble, there’s another threat on the horizon. Wal-Mart is encroaching on the banking industry by providing more financial services to its millions of customers.

The giant retailer has partnered with other companies to offer consumers money transfers, check cashing and bill payment services, and virtual checking accounts in the form of refillable, pre-paid debit cards, said CNN.com.

Wal-Mart has tried several times in the past to acquire its own banking license but failed. Now Wal-Mart is seeking regulatory approval to acquire a small Utah-based bank for $15.7 million, according to CNN.com.

Last week the company opened its 1,000th “Money Center” and has plans to open 500 more. Wal-Mart has operated a bank in Mexico since 2007. After receiving a banking license in Canda last month, the company has rolled out a new Wal-Mart credit card.

In addition to making money on banking fees, Wal-Mart encourages customers to shop at the store by offering cash-back incentives and other deals.

The company believes it can provide alternative banking services to at least 25 percent of the U.S. population, noting that 28 million people in the country don’t have a bank account.

“Wal-Mart is going to accelerate the evolution of the banking industry,” Anthony Plath, a finance professor at the University of North Carolina, told CNN.  “They would be a different kind of bank, but the kind of bank the industry may need right now.”

Do you wander around the aisles of your local supermarket or drugstore in a zombie-like haze, unable to distinguish one product from another, sometimes forgetting why you’re even there? You may be experiencing brand overload, and you’re not alone.

Shoppers are buying less and looking for bargains, so retailers like Wal-Mart are discontinuing stocking some weaker selling brand-name products and replacing them with cheaper store brands, said CNNMoney.com.

As Wal-Mart goes, other stores are sure to follow, and drugstore chains like CVS and Walgreens and the discount chain Target are also trying to simplify their shelves, said CNN. In a recession when shoppers are cutting back, variety can actually hurt sales.

“I think the feeling is that as these companies keep extending their [product] lines, it’s only causing confusion for shoppers and not really driving them to buy more products,” Lora Cecera, a retail expert at the consulting firm Altimeter Group, told CNN. “Do I really need to decide between 15 different types of toothpaste when I go to a store?”

With fewer options, shoppers are more likely to turn to cheaper house brands, boosting sales and loyalty for the retailers’ own product line. A recent survey by Sanford C. Bernstein & Co. found that 77 percent of consumers who downgraded to store brands were satisfied with the product, said CNN. Some analysts say that by cutting brands, Wal-Mart and other retailers are in a position to get better deals from suppliers on pricing and advertising.

Wal-Mart, the world’s largest retailer, is cutting 11,200 jobs at its Sam’s Club stores, reported Business Week.

The store will eliminate about 10,000 product demonstrator positions, most of them part-time, after hiring an outside marketing company, Shopper Events, to take over demonstration operations, Sam’s Club Chief Executive Officer Brian Cornell said in a memo to employees. The warehouse chain will cut another 1,200 membership recruiting jobs – two in each of the 600 Sam’s Club stores across the country.

The memo, posted on the Wal-Mart web site, said the change is an effort to improve in-store sampling and demonstrations of food and beverages, personal wellness and electronics products.

In a separate announcement on Jan. 11, Wal-Mart said it will close 10 under-performing Sam’s Club stores, eliminating about 1,500 jobs, said Business Week. Overall, Sam’s Club employs about 110,000 people.

Shopper Events, based in Rogers, Ark., said it would hire about the same number of employees that Sam’s Club is letting go, according to Business Week.

Laid-off Sam’s Club employees can apply for the Shopper Events jobs. The company already handles in-store demonstrations for Wal-Mart.

Preliminary data show relatively strong Black Friday sales, but also indicate many holiday shoppers may be avoiding the crowds and doing their bargain hunting from the comfort of home.

Data from the research firm ShopperTrak RCT Corp. show shoppers spent $10.7 billion – about 0.5 percent more than last year — when they hit the stores on the day after Thanksgiving, reported MSNBC.com.

The National Retail Federation said there were more Black Friday shoppers this year than in 2008, but shoppers on average spent less money.

The average amount online shoppers spent Friday rose 35 percent from last year, according to Web marketing analyst Coremetrics. The average online order was roughly $170, and shoppers bought more items with each order, said the company.

The TV shopping network QVC reported $32 million in sales on Black Friday, a 60 percent jump from last year, said MSNBC.com.

Heavily hyped Black Friday “doorbusters” sales draw hordes of bargain-hungry shoppers, some of whom camp out at stores for hours to be first in line when doors open early in the morning. Last year, a Wal-Mart employee in Long Island, N.Y., was trampled to death while trying to open the store’s door at 5 a.m.

Deep discounts on big-ticket items such as televisions, computers and other electronics are a major draw for customers. The National Retail Federation said high-definition TVs, laptops, Zhu Zhu Pets and winter coats were popular this year, reported Bloomberg News.

Consumer spending at major retailers dropped in May, the 10th month in a row of same-store sales declines, according to a survey by Goldman Sachs and the International Council of Shopping Centers.

Overall same-store sales fell 4.6 percent, according to the Goldman Sachs study, worse than the 3 percent drop predicted.

Wal-Mart, the world’s largest retailer, has posted gains but stopped reporting its sales numbers in May. Other major retailers are still showing year-to-year declines, with Target’s May 2009 sales down 6 percent from May 2008, Costco’s sales were down 7 percent and Macy’s sales down 9 percent.

While consumer confidence has lifted, shoppers still aren’t ready to open up their wallets at the cash register, citing fears about job losses and falling home prices. Consumers are spending money on necessities like food and health care, said the Associated Press.

“I think the initial panic is over, but now the tough work begins. We’re entering a slow summer period when there’s not a lot to attract consumers into the stores,” BMO Capital Markets analyst John Morris told the Associated Press.