Walmart’s delivery operation — by the numbers
Last year was a busy one for Walmart's ever-expanding delivery operation.
In an infographic emailed to Chain Store Age, Walmart highlighted a number of metrics from its delivery activities in fiscal year 2023 (ended Jan. 31, 2023). The retail giant's delivery milestones achieved during the 12-month period included:
- Walmart filled 3,165 miles of ocean containers in fiscal year 2023, or enough containers to span the U.S. from Los Angeles to Bangor, Maine.
- Walmart made 248 million last-mile deliveries from 3,990 stores offering delivery.
- The Spark Delivery platform, which connects crowdsourced independent drivers with Walmart delivery opportunities, is the discounter’s largest local delivery service provider. Spark Delivery offers 84% U.S. household coverage and 15,000 pickup points, and saw 3x growth in drivers during fiscal year 2023.
- Walmart would have received ranking as a top 40 trucking firm during the fiscal year, based on backhaul revenue (cargo hauled on the return from a delivery) alone.
- Drivers making deliveries for Walmart drove more than 1 billion safe miles, or the equivalent of driving around the Earth 40,000 times, in fiscal year 2023. Thirty-seven drivers drove over 3 million safe miles each.
Walmart GoLocal – a closer look
Walmart also released data specific to its GoLocal hosted white-label, delivery-as-a-service technology to manage last-mile deliveries. Designed to take on the likes of Instacart and DoorDash, Walmart GoLocal delivers goods to customers of other businesses. Notable retailers making deliveries using the service include Home Depot, Lowes, Chico’s, and Kelly-Moore Paints.
[Read more: Walmart moves into Instacart turf with delivery service]
Highlights of Walmart GoLocal from the fiscal year include:
- Walmart GoLocal provided delivery from 10,000 retail locations during the fiscal year.
- The platform surpassed 3.5 million completed deliveries in fiscal 2023.
- Nine out of 10 surveyed clients said they would recommend Walmart GoLocal.
“Last year was an incredibly strong year for Walmart delivery, and I’m so proud of the team for achieving these milestones,” Jennifer McKeehan, senior VP end-to-end delivery, Walmart, said in commentary provided to Chain Store Age. From our Private Fleet to the Spark Driver Platform to Walmart GoLocal, we remain diligently focused on executing safe and efficient deliveries, so that customers can continue receiving the items they want and need most from Walmart and Walmart GoLocal clients.”
Based in Bentonville, Ark., Walmart operates more than 10,500 stores and clubs under 46 banners in 24 countries and e-commerce websites.