Guns and fabric are back at Walmart

A couple of promotional pieces from Walmart hit the marketplace in recent weeks underscoring that Walmart may be nearing the completion of its Project Impact course correction strategy.

The week of Sept. 18 a four-page insert dropped announcing that “fabrics are back” and that new and expanded product assortment are available in 2,000 stores. This past weekend another promotion piece hit the market focused on the hunting category with a similar message around new and expanded assortments.

The fact that Walmart is again promoting such categories as fabrics and hunting is a telling reminder of how Walmart is attempting to reconnect with core customers. Assortments in those categories were negatively affected by the SKU rationalization effort that was part of Project Impact and resulted in lost trips and weak sales. Fabrics and hunting may not be high growth businesses, but better to have them restored as meaningful components of the product mix than to de-emphasize them to the point where longtime loyal customers feel they are no longer being served.