The world’s largest retailer is quickly becoming a big factor in online grocery shopping. In fact, consumer market researcher Packaged Facts said late last year that 23% of online grocery consumers cited Walmart as the retailer they use most for groceries. Amazon is the only retailer cited more often (38%).
As far as in-store grocery shopping goes, Walmart is the king. About 27% of in-store shoppers said Walmart is the store they most often buy groceries from. That’s more than double the number of people that cited Kroger, the second most popular food retailer.
Package Facts noted that Walmart has successfully transformed itself into an omnichannel retailer, in part by turning its thousands of stores into a competitive strength in distribution.
By the end if its 2019 fiscal year (1/31/20), Walmart expects to have 2,140 online grocery pickup sites, covering nearly 70% of U.S. households, and online delivery through 800 stores, covering about 40% of the population.
The company expects to reach its goal of 40% growth in U.S. e-commerce sales for fiscal 2019.