Walmart bets on faster deliveries and ad insights to drive growth

Retailer Walmart Inc is sharpening its focus on speed and convenience as it aims to serve customers faster than ever before.

Speaking at Goldman Sachs’ 32nd Annual Global Retailing Conference, Walmart President and Chief Executive Doug McMillon said the retailer is now rated by customers not just for price but also for convenience—an area where it has historically lagged.

“Our ability to get to somebody’s house in less than 30 minutes here in the US, or in India and China, or even faster, is increasing as the months and quarters go by,” said McMillon, calling delivery speed a key driver of top-line growth.

India: A key market

India has emerged as a critical growth market for Walmart alongside the United States and China.

For Walmart, India is becoming more than a sourcing hub. The retailer has a significant presence in the Indian economy through ecommerce unit Flipkart and payments arm PhonePe.

While the US remains Walmart’s largest market, McMillon said India represents “a great opportunity” driven partly by the marketplace model built through Flipkart.

Walmart acquired a controlling stake in Flipkart in 2018 for $16 billion. Flipkart is today one of India’s largest online retailers, with a thriving marketplace that complements Walmart’s global push to diversify beyond first-party sales.

Advertising bet

Meanwhile, the company’s advertising arm, Walmart Connect, is expanding internationally. McMillon noted that Walmart’s unified tech stack provides advertising insights across markets—be it Mexico, Canada or India—helping brands measure the effectiveness of campaigns across both online channel and physical stores. 

“The advertising number is just going to continue to grow with one of the advantages being that we are omnichannel, and we can tell someone who’s bought an ad if it was effective later on in a brick-and-mortar environment,” said McMillon.

“One of the unique things about Walmart Connect is that you may run an ad. In the past, you could only see digital closure in the moment or digital closure that might come later. Now we can frequently tell you even if there’s a different method of payment that’s used that someone did end up purchasing that item that did see the ad.”

Tariff impact

McMillon flagged the impact of tariffs, particularly with respect to India. Cautioning that steep tariffs could push price points beyond consumers’ reach, leading to sales declines, he urged for a “quick resolution” of the tariff issue and “overall lower rates”.

Walmart, he said, is absorbing costs across categories to ensure affordability.