47 Interesting Walmart Facts: Things You Should Not Miss Out On

Walmart store is a retail corporation in the US operating a large chain of discount supermarkets, departmental stores, and groceries stores throughout the world.

Walmart serves people in the name of Walmart discount stores, Walmart supercenters, Walmart Neighborhood Markets, and Walmart International. It is the world's biggest company, with a revenue of $548.743 billion.

There are around 1000 Walmart discount stores in the US that employ more than 225 people. The store provides a convenient shopping experience, offering more than 1,20,000 quality items of varying ranges and prices. The items include apparel, home furnishings, health and beauty products, electronics items, automotive products, sports goods and toys, jewelry, household items, and more.

A Walmart supercenter is a one-stop shopping place for a family that operates 24/7 for the ultimate convenience. More than 3,570 supercenters employ approximately 350 people, and people can purchase groceries and general merchandise at a low price under one roof.

Bakery goods, frozen foods, meat, and dairy products are also available in these centers. Supercenters are also the home of Subway restaurants, studios, salons, and spas.

Walmart Neighborhood Markets are a chain of grocery markets, and the major selling categories in these markets are groceries, general merchandise, and pharmaceuticals. Some stores offer fuel, wine, and beer sales. Around 683 supermarkets employ 90 full-time and 95 part-time workers, offering more than 29,000 items.

Sam's Club is the warehouse club started by the Walmart owner that offers a large volume of items for smaller businesses at wholesale prices. The club provides supplies and materials to business owners and places like offices, schools, churches, and more.

Around 584 clubs employ more than 160 workers and offer around 5500 product varieties. A nominal membership fee of $35 for businesses and $40 for individuals has to be paid by the members to enjoy the club's benefits.

Walmart International operates outside the US with more than 176 million customers across the globe.

History

Walmart store is a one-stop shopping center started by Sam Walton that created a retail revolution with the notion of the lowest prices anytime, anywhere. The primary focus for Walton was to sell products at a lower price, which resulted in a higher volume of sales with lower profit.

He managed to buy goods at low prices from various suppliers to achieve the target, which was the secret behind his success. The company now operates in different countries under different names.

In the '60s Sam Walton started the first store in Rogers, Arkansas, the United States, on July 2, 1962.

Within five years, in 1967, the family-owned 24 stores with $12.7 million in sales. The company created its corporation in 1969 and, in 1970, named it Walmart Stores, Inc.

In the '70s Walmart became a public company and was listed on the New York Stock Exchange. A home office and first distribution center were opened in Bentonville, Arkansas.

Walmart stores were started in various states of the US like Kansas, Louisiana, Missouri, Oklahoma, Tennessee, Kentucky, Mississippi, and Texas from 1972 to 1975.

In 1975, around 125 stores employed 7,500 people, with $340.3 million in sales.

Sam's Club was started in 1983. With rapid growth, in 1987, during the 25th year, there were 1,198 stores.

Walmart installed a private satellite network for voice and video communication between their various stores.

In 1988, Walmart supercenter was started in Washington, and David Glass became the CEO.

The first Walmart store was started in Mexico in 1991. At the age of 74, Sam Walton passed away in 1992.

The store was expanded to Canada in 1994 and China in 1996. In 1998, Walmart entered the UK, acquiring Asda. Walmart Neighborhood Market was started in Arkansas.

In 2000, the company became a retail giant with $165 billion in sales. H. Lee Scott became the CEO of Walmart.

In 2002, Walmart got a place on Fortune 500 list. Walmart also entered Japan.

During the hurricanes of Katrina and Rita in 2005, Walmart provided great support in finance, food, and jobs to the workers with its logistics network and supply chains.

In 2007, Walmart started online sales through Walmart.com. Shoppers can order from their homes and pick up the goods from the stores. In 2009, Mike Duke became the CEO.

The first Walmart store, named Bharti Walmart, was opened in India. In 2018 the company name changed from Wal-Mart to Walmart.

The first Walmart health center was opened in 2019.

Walmart International Affairs

Walmart could not afford to limit its activities to the United States due to the need for expansion for three reasons. Firstly, it had already saturated the majority of domestic markets. Second, the United States has a population of slightly over 4% of the world's total.

Walmart wanted to utilize the remaining population too. Finally, emerging economies provided enormous opportunities for expansion in cheap shopping due to their lower disposable income levels. Walmart's globalization was necessary to fight with its competitors.

Walmart operates retail and e-commerce stores in 24 countries worldwide. Walmart's worldwide business has 5,251 shops and 800,000 employees in 23 countries outside of the United States as of January 31, 2022.

There are completely owned subsidiaries in Argentina, Brazil, Canada, and the United Kingdom. Walmart is a private company with the largest number of employees in the United States and Mexico, and one of the largest in Canada, with 2.2 million employees globally.

Walmart's foreign segment had revenues of US$120.824 billion in the fiscal year 2019, accounting for 23.7% of total sales.

Walmart first opened in Mexico in 1991 as a joint venture between Walmart and Cifra. In 2010, it was renamed Walmart de Mexico y Centroamérica. There are 2755 Walmart stores in Mexico as of January 2022.

Walmart Canada was started on March 17, 1994, and it currently operates 408 stores in the country.

Walmart International's retail chain proved to be more profitable in countries like the UK, South America, and China.

Walmart entered Germany in 1997, purchasing two German retail chains, Wertkauf for €750 million and Interspar for a staggering (Deutsche Mark) DM 1.3 billion.

The main reasons for Walmart's failure in Germany were predatory pricing, which destroyed local businesses, introduced American culture in German stores, and violated German labor laws.

Walmart had to depart Germany in 2006 after losing $1 billion. All 85 locations were sold to the German business Metro during Walmart's fiscal third quarter.

Walmart opened its first store in South Korea in 1998. Walmart announced that it was going to withdraw from South Korea in May 2006, selling its 16 shops to Shinsegae Co, the country's largest discount retailer, for 825 billion won ($882 million).

Walmart bought Asda, a UK-based supermarket chain, for 6.7 billion euros in 1999 by outbidding Kingfisher.

Asda is currently owned by the Issa brothers and TDR Capital, which bought Asda for 6.8 billion euros in February 2021.

Online Commerce Acquisitions And Plans

Walmart has made many acquisitions in the past few years to expand its presence in e-commerce and mainly to compete with e-commerce giant, Amazon. Jet.com and its creator Marc Lore, who now oversees Walmart's e-commerce sector, fuelled Walmart's e-commerce expansion, putting the firm second only behind Amazon in terms of e-commerce sales market share.

At the same time, Walmart lost more than $1 billion in e-commerce in 2019.

Vudu, an American digital video streaming service, was purchased by Walmart in 2010 for almost $100 million.

In 2020, Fandango Media acquired Vudu from Walmart for an undisclosed amount.

Walmart bought Jet.com, an e-commerce business launched in 2014 by Marc Lore, in September 2016 to compete with Amazon.com.

In 2020, Walmart announced that Jet would be phased out. 

Bonobos, a leading online men's apparel brand, was acquired by Walmart for $310 million on June 16, 2017.

On February 13, 2017, Walmart bought Moosejaw for around $51 million. Moosejaw is a retailer that sells apparel for snowboarding, rock climbing, hiking, and camping.

Walmart acquired Flipkart, an Indian online e-commerce company, in 2018. Walmart bought a 77% stake in the company for $16 billion, and Walmart currently has an 82.1% controlling stake in Flipkart.

Some other acquisitions made by Walmart include Parcel (acquired for an undisclosed price on September 29, 2017.), ShoeBuy (purchased in 2016 for $70 million), ModCloth (in 2017 for around $50 million) and Art.com (in 2018).

Initiatives Taken By Walmart

Walmart took several initiatives to improve its sales and overcome its competitors. Some initiatives provide consumers with the best benefits.

Walmart established an initiative in September 2006 to sell generic medicines for $4 per prescription. The initiative began in shops in Tampa, Florida, and by January 2007, it had spread to all of Florida's stores. Generics cost $29 on average per prescription, compared to $102 for name-brand medicines.

The firm launched a 'beta' version of a movie download service on February 6, 2007, selling around 3,000 films and television episodes from all major studios and television networks. Due to short sales, the service was terminated on December 21, 2007.

Walmart introduced a new membership club named 'Walmart Plus' in February 2020.

The announcement came shortly after Walmart revealed that its personal shopping service, Jetblack, would be discontinued.

Walmart began testing a free grocery pickup service in 2015, allowing consumers to choose products online and pick them up at the store. At the store, a Walmart employee puts the groceries into the customer's car. This changed the face of the grocery market.

The service is currently available in 39 US states as of December 17, 2017.

To stay competitive with Amazon, Walmart stated in May 2016 that it would update its three-day shipping service, ShippingPass, to a two-day delivery service.

It costs 49 dollars a year at Walmart, compared to 99 dollars with Amazon Prime.

In November 2005, various environmental initiatives were launched by Walmart to increase energy efficiency and its environmental record, which had previously been inadequate.

Walmart's primary objectives included spending $500 million per year to improve fuel efficiency in its truck fleet by 25% in three years and doubling it in ten; reducing greenhouse gas emissions by 20% in seven years; reducing energy use in stores by 30%, and reducing solid waste from US stores and Sam's Clubs by 25% in three years.

Walmart established its energy firm in Texas, Texas Retail Energy, to supply its shops with low-cost, wholesale electricity.

The corporation expects to save $15 million per year due to this new initiative.

Walmart was also one of the first retailers to use radio-frequency identification (RFID) technology, where suppliers embed microchips in items to store extensive product information.

Walmart was able to detect the goods that were selling well, when they needed to be refilled in shops, and how many of them to place on the shelves using this technology. Inventory management became more efficient as a result of this.

Walmart is largely considered a supply chain management industry leader. Walmart has pioneered a variety of tactics that help it remain competitive in the pricing war against its competitors, in addition to utilizing the most up-to-date technological breakthroughs such as the barcode and RFID.

To improve its supply chain, automation, and technology, Walmart spent $14 billion in 2021.

The company has decided to increase its home delivery service, InHome, to serve 30 million US households by the end of 2022. Walmart filed several trademarks in December 2021 to create its own cryptocurrency and non-fungible tokens(NFTs).

FAQs

What are some fun facts about Walmart?

The first Walmart store, opened by Sam Walton in Bentonville, Arkansas, is now The Walmart Museum. The largest Walmart store is located in Albany, New york.

What is Walmart best known for?

Walmart provides commodities of good quality at reasonable prices.

What time does Walmart close?

Walmart stores close at 11 pm.

What time does Walmart open?

Walmart stores usually open at 6 a.m. or 7 a.m. A Walmart Supercenter is usually open 24/7.

How much does Walmart pay?

After a raise in 2021, the minimum wage of Walmart workers is $12 per hour. The average wage of a warehouse associate is $16.76 an hour.

Who owns Walmart?

Around 50% of Walmart is owned by the Walton family.

How much is Walmart worth?

Walmart's market capitalization is $395 billion as of 2022.

How many employees does Walmart have?

As of January 2021, there are about 2,300,000 Walmart employees, and in the US, there are about 1,600,000 employees.

How many Walmarts are in the world?

As of January 31, 2022, there are 10,593 stores worldwide.

What is Walmart's biggest selling item?

The most sold product in Walmart is bananas.