Case Study: Walmart achieves streamlined supply chain and inventory automation with QuickBooks Commerce

Walmart - Customer Case Study

Walmart faced the enormous challenge of managing inventory and logistics for a global retail network—over 11,700 stores, $32 billion in inventory and millions of employees—while keeping costs low enough to sustain its “everyday low price” strategy. The core problem was moving the right products to the right stores at the right time across a complex supplier and distribution network without inflating inventory or distribution costs.

Walmart addressed this with supply‑chain simplification and tight supplier collaboration (vendor‑managed inventory and strategic sourcing), cross‑docking to minimize storage time, and heavy investments in technology—barcodes, Retail Link, RFID, automated reordering and in‑store systems like Top Stock. The result was dramatically lower distribution and carrying costs (distribution costs around 1.7% of sales), near‑perfect order fulfillment, faster replenishment, reduced out‑of‑stocks and sustained competitive pricing that helped secure Walmart’s market leadership.

Walmart

James Crowell

Director of the Supply Chain Management Research Center