What: Walmart keeps improving its omnichannel capability.

Why it is important: Assets that used to serve a single purpose have to transform into flexible, scalable assets that can be used in multiple ways.

Walmart keeps moving on quickly to use their physical retail stores to not only serve in-store shoppers, but to flex to meet the needs of online shoppers, too. The company has identified four of their stores across the U.S. to serve as test centers where they will continuously rotate new technology, digital tools and physical enhancements in and out of the stores all with the intention of helping associates better and more easily serve customers. Among other examples, they will be testing:

• Omni-assortment to learn what it takes to make all eligible items in the store truly omni.
• Inventory speed to get product on the shelf faster.
• First time pick-rate to help associates navigate to the right locations when picking items for an online order.
• Check-out experience to help transform a transactional experience into a relational one

In This New Era of Retail, We’re Testing New Ways to Operate, and It’s the Customer Who Wins

Related item:

• Walmart: thinking outside the (big) box