Walmart Is Working on an Amazon Prime Competitor Called Walmart+
In 2005, Amazon came out with Amazon Prime, and online shopping as we know it was never the same. Prime now has over 150 million members worldwide (I’ll let you try to do the membership fee math there). According to eMarketer, Amazon currently accounts for almost 40 percent of online retail sales in the U.S., and a large factor for that has to do with their coveted Prime membership offers.
The second highest online retailer is Walmart with 5 percent of the U.S. e-commerce market — but that number might soon grow.
According to Recode, Walmart has been secretly working on a new paid membership program that would have serious perks that Amazon Prime wouldn’t be able to currently offer. The new program is apparently called “Walmart+” and testing in certain markets could start as early as next month or in April. It’s essentially a rebranding of Walmart’s current Delivery Unlimited service, which charges users $98 a year for unlimited, same-day delivery of groceries from 1,600-plus Walmart stores in the United States.
They are also hoping to make Walmart+ even more user-friendly with an extra feature that would let customers text to place their orders and schedule delivery. And long term, they’ll tack on even more features, like discounts on prescription medicine at Walmart pharmacies, snacks at Walmart gas stations, as well as a cool new Scan & Go service where people can check out in Walmart stores without waiting in line.
Walmart is still currently the largest overall retailer in the United States, but according to Supermarket News, this may change by 2022. Still, Walmart e-commerce sales were up 37 percent from last year, and with the addition of Walmart+, we can only expect that number to rise.
Is Walmart+ something you see yourself using in the future? Or do you see yourself using Prime more? Let us know in the comments!