"It's hard to find a store"? Walmart is investing heavily in e-commerce business

The growth rate of Walmart's online business in recent years has been obvious to all, and the platform is also constantly improving its operating system. It can be said that Walmart is already the most worthwhile platform to join besides Amazon.

Especially after the Amazon ban, Walmart’s advantages have become apparent. With its complete offline sales model, concentrated target users, less intense competition, and large profit margins, Walmart has become the first stop for cross-border sellers to “shift their battle lines.”

Many sellers have found that since Walmart opened its investment promotion business to the Chinese market, it has become difficult to get an account number. Some sellers have complained to NANA that the attitude of Walmart's investment promotion managers is very bad and their efficiency is very low. However, the account manager is very important. Not only for resources, but also for problems encountered by the account, cases, applications for restricted goods, and lagtime applications all require the account manager.

So why does this phenomenon occur?

First of all, Walmart is still in its growth stage and is a hot commodity in the hands of cross-border sellers. In addition, the number of third-party sellers on the platform is less than 100,000, so the competitive pressure is small, and sellers are eager to join Walmart.

Secondly, Walmart's 0-capital entry policy is really attractive to sellers. Sellers who enter Walmart only need to pay the category commission after entering. There is no need for platform monthly rental fees or entry fees.

But the main reason is that Walmart just announced last week that it would completely remove the GMV threshold. In 2021, when Walmart first started recruiting merchants, one of the requirements for sellers to enter was that the annual GMV of the sellers was 3 million yuan or more. Later, it was relaxed to 300,000 yuan, and now the GMV threshold limit has been completely removed. This also means that more sellers will want to enter Walmart in the future.

As the world's largest retailer, Walmart can not only enhance its brand image by expanding its market, but also gain the influence of the Walmart brand and more consumer trust. Naturally, more sellers will want to move in in the future!

In NANA's opinion, the steady growth of the Walmart platform is a very important factor in attracting sellers to join, and the most obvious manifestation of this is the continuous growth of consumers on the platform!

The epidemic has been relaxed for some time, and many people are paying attention to the recovery of the market. Now the market is gradually returning to its previous state.

From the logic of consumption rebound, the consumer services industry will begin to recover first, followed by discretionary consumption, and finally essential consumption.

The reason for this rebound order is mainly because the service industry has an impact from the very beginning, such as catering and tourism.

Under the influence of causality, optional consumption such as hotels, media, and automobiles also began to decline.

But necessary consumption can become hard currency even in extreme cases, such as Coca-Cola.

Compared with the first two, we can say that the impact on necessary consumption is negligible.

However, Walmart does not seem to have been greatly affected. When we look at the financial report of Walmart, the world's largest retail chain, we also find that as a retailer of essential consumer goods, their operating income has increased from US$495.76 billion in 2018 to US$567.76 billion in 2022. Revenue has been growing in the past five years.

In the fourth quarter (November 1, 2022 - January 31, 2023), Walmart achieved operating revenue of US$164 billion, a year-on-year increase of 7.3%, exceeding market expectations. Net profit was US$6.3 billion, a year-on-year increase of 76.2%.

Throughout the fiscal year, Walmart's operating revenue reached US$611.3 billion (approximately RMB 421.1612 billion), a year-on-year increase of 6.7%.

Walmart CEO McMillon said the company's team quickly responded to inventory and cost challenges and is ready to start the new fiscal year.

Walmart is cautious about its performance outlook for the new year, predicting that consolidated net sales will increase by 4.5% to 5.0% in the first quarter of fiscal 2024, with adjusted earnings per share of $1.25 to $1.30. For the full year of fiscal 2024, consolidated net sales will increase by 2.5% to 3.0%, with adjusted earnings per share of $5.90-6.05.

Walmart has huge scale advantages in the market of small and medium-sized enterprise customers. With many years of offline experience, it can approach 90% of the US population within 10 miles. Combined with e-commerce platforms, fulfillment and delivery, the potential for corporate customer orders is huge. Walmart Business currently has more than 100,000 items on the shelves, including office supplies and furniture, food and beverages, kitchen and bathroom supplies, electronic products, classroom and office supplies, etc.

With a huge market base and solid financial security, cross-border e-commerce sellers can continue to focus on Walmart this year.