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Walmart 2024-25: A Six-Pillar Roadmap to Digital Retail Dominance
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At a Glance
- Six-Pillar Roadmap: Walmart’s 2024-25 strategy pivots on Digital Commerce, Retail Media, AI, Automation, Supply Chain, and Loyalty—each pillar will get its own deep-dive article.
- E-Commerce Momentum: Online sales already make up 18% of revenue after four straight quarters of 20% growth, the Next article unpacks the 2025 e-commerce playbook.
- Retail-Media Surge: Walmart Connect ad revenue jumped 50% last quarter; a forthcoming piece breaks down how private label and VIZIO fuel software-level margins.
- AI & Automation Stack: From Gen AI “My Assistant” to next-gen FCs that cut unit costs by 20%, we’ll soon tour the tech that powers every other pillar.
- Same-Day at 95% Coverage: Drones, store-fulfilled delivery, and CA$6.5 B in new Supercentres push Walmart toward nationwide <24-hour reach—the supply-chain deep dive will detail the economics.
Walmart enters FY 2025 as a $681 billion, 10750-store behemoth that serves approximately 270 million customers every week across 19 countries, yet the Chief Executive, Doug McMillon, of the world’s largest retailer now describes it as “people-led, tech-powered, omnichannel.”
That shift is visible everywhere: e-commerce already accounts for 18% of global sales, and has delivered four straight quarters of 20% growth. The advertising revenue from Walmart Connect increased by 30% last year, while automated “next-gen” fulfillment centers are slicing unit costs by double digits. The revenue increased by 5.1% and the operating income by 8.6% in FY 2025.
Against that backdrop, 2024-25 looks less like an incremental upgrade and more like Walmart’s blueprint for digital-first retail dominance. Its strategy clusters around six tightly linked levers:
Digital Commerce
Global e-commerce sales grew 16% in Q4 FY 2025 and 22% in Q1 FY 2026, driven by a store-fulfilled network that already covers 93% of U.S. households and a marketplace logging >30 % GMV growth every quarter. With Walmart’s e-commerce digital arm now turning into a profit engine accounting for 18% of company revenue, by monetizing paid <3-hour delivery and compressing last-mile costs, the retailer has flipped the script on a once loss-making asset.
Next article: a step-by-step look at Walmart’s 2025 e-commerce playbook, from same-day density math to marketplace fee mix.
Retail Media
Walmart Connect finished FY 2025 at roughly $3.2 billion in ad sales, then accelerated to 50% growth in Q1 FY 2026 as the VIZIO CTV inventory came fully online. Because on-site and in-app ads earn software-level margins of ~70%, retail media lifted company ROI by 50 bps even while grocery price pressure persisted. Brands now plough 2–3% of their Walmart sales back into Connect campaigns, and off-site extensions are climbing faster still.
Next article: we’ll break down the retail-media P&L, CPM benchmarks, and how private-label exclusivity super-charges ad yield.
AI Use Cases
From the “My Assistant” GenAI tool rolling out to 2.1 million associates to large-language-model demand sensors that pre-position inventory, Walmart is operationalizing AI at every layer. The 2024-25 roadmap adds a customer-facing shopping agent, computer-vision checkout, and an LLM that slashes fashion lead times by 18 weeks.
Next article: a guided tour of Global Tech’s AI stack—what’s live today, what’s in pilot, and the ROI guardrails leadership applies to new models.
Automation
Four “next-gen” fulfillment centers each doubling storage capacity and daily throughput are live, with Stockton, CA slated for 2026; by then 65% of U.S. stores and 55% of FC volume will run through automated flows that trim unit costs ~20%. In-store, Alphabot pickers, shelf-scan drones, and predictive scheduling attack labor pain points.
Next article: we’ll trace how robotics, scan-&-go, and automated DCs knit together into a single cost-curve-reset strategy.
Supply Chain
Having topped 150k drone drop-offs, Walmart is scaling to 100 drone-enabled stores across five states, complementing autonomous middle-mile trucks and high-tech perishable DCs. The goal: 95% same-day coverage by YE 2025 and route densification that lowers the cost per drop. Abroad, Walmart Canada’s C$6.5 billion cap-ex on Supercentres and DC modernization shows the model travels well.
Next article: the hard economics of drone delivery—capex, per-mile cost, and sales lift.
Personalization & Loyalty
Affluent households (>$100k) accounted for 75% of share gains in 2024, and membership income jumped 14.8% year-over-year last quarter as Walmart+ bundled free same-day shipping, fuel, and streaming. With 30% of members buying express delivery, AI-driven segmentation now tailors perks based on speed, basket, and lifetime value.
Next article: How Walmart uses predictive personalization and Walmart+ perks to lock in higher-margin shoppers.
Together, these six pillars form a self-reinforcing flywheel: Automation lowers fulfillment costs ➜ Faster delivery lifts digital conversion ➜ Richer data fuels retail-media margins ➜ Fresh cash funds more tech.
Over the next few weeks, this series will unpack each lever showcasing what Walmart is doing, why it works, and how other grocers can apply the lessons.
Why It Matters For Grocers
Grocery Doppio’s 2025 Digital Grocery Outlook shows that fulfillment densification, omnichannel engagement and digital monetization are the three levers that will separate winners from laggards. Walmart is already firing on all three, turning scale into sustainable margin. Each pillar above unpacks one lever; together they form a blueprint any grocer can benchmark.
If you’re looking for solutions, reach out to insights@grocerydoppio.com.
Neha Ghai
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