Whole Foods, Walmart Battle It Out For Wealthiest Customers

Battle Of The Retail Giants Walmart and Amazon are fighting for customers, and Whole Foods is serving as the latest battleground. Whereas Walmart was once seen as the giant...

Battle Of The Retail Giants

Walmart and Amazon are fighting for customers, and Whole Foods is serving as the latest battleground. Whereas Walmart was once seen as the giant that destroyed America’s mom and pop stores, now Amazon seems to have taken on that role. But according to Business Insider, Whole Foods’ initial tactic of dropping prices to “steal” Walmart customers hasn’t worked as well as they hoped.

When accounting for the total percentage of Walmart customers who defected to Whole Foods the first week after the acquisition, it’s just 0.6% of Walmart customers. Amazon purchased Whole Foods for $13.7. Overall, the customers who defected to Whole Foods from grocery rivals were wealthier than the retailer’s average shopper. Walmart’s regular customers’ average income is just over $59,000. However, the average income of a Walmart customer that is defecting to Whole Foods is nearly $72,000 a year.

Whole Foods has always been a company that is very choosy about the items they are willing to sell, whereas Walmart was started to sell everything at the lowest price possible. Even though when Amazon bought Whole Foods, it lowered many of the store’s prices, Walmart’s prices are still markedly cheaper.

Market analysts feel that Whole Foods will have to continue to reduce many of its’ prices in order to entice the customers who would normally do their shopping at Walmart. As part of Amazon’s goal is to get more customers to buy their groceries online, they will have to make their prices competitive in order to bump up the percentage of people shopping with them instead of Walmart.