Walmart employs a multichannel retail strategy to serve its diverse customer base globally. These channels are designed to maximise convenience, accessibility, and customer satisfaction.

Walmart has implemented blockchain technology to enhance its supply chain operations, particularly in food safety and traceability. Collaborating with IBM, Walmart utilised the Hyperledger Fabric blockchain platform to create a transparent and immutable system for tracking products. This approach has significantly reduced the time to trace food origins from days to seconds, improving accountability and consumer trust.

Key Highlights:

Food traceability: Walmart initially piloted blockchain for tracing mangos in the U.S. and pork in China. The system reduced tracing times from 7 days to 2.2 seconds.
Technology benefits: Blockchain ensures data immutability, transparency, and reliability, minimising risks such as fraud and contamination.
Operational efficiency: The system allows all supply chain participants to access the same data, eliminating discrepancies and reducing reliance on intermediaries.
Scalability: Walmart has expanded the blockchain solution to include over 25 products, including leafy greens, dairy, and meat, requiring suppliers to adopt the system.
Sustainability and trust: The technology supports ethical sourcing and provides customers with information about product origins, contributing to sustainability goals.

Question 1: Explain whether you believe Walmart has developed a cost advantage or a value advantage (or both a cost and value advantage) in their supply chain through the application of Blockchain Technology.

Guidelines:

Refer to the contents of Chapter 1 of the following textbook to answer the question: Christopher, M. (2023). Logistics & Supply Chain Management. 6^th ed. Harlow: Pearson Education Limited. You are welcome to provide a concise comment highlighting the key points that address the answer to the question.

Question 2: Familiarise yourself with Walmart Inc., its range of retail formats, and its many businesses trading under different labels, such as ASDA in the UK, Lider in Chile, Makro and Game in Africa, and Despensa Familiar in Central America. This multinational organisation has enjoyed success since its inception in 1962 because it has developed market-driven supply chains. From your research it should be clear that Walmart does not believe that ‘one size fits all’. Using your analysis, identify two distinct categories of customers where Walmart has created appropriate supply chain solutions. Describe each consumer segment in terms of what the group values most (defined by the value proposition offered by the channel) and the preferences of each group (their buying behaviours). In your discussion of characteristics, remember that market segmentation in supply chain management does not rely on demographics such as the age, gender or education level of consumers in the FMCG market.

Guidelines:

Key sales channels used by Walmart

Physical stores:
- Format: Walmart operates over 10,500 stores worldwide under various banners, including Supercentres, Discount Stores, and Neighbourhood Markets.
- Features: These stores provide a broad assortment of goods, including groceries, apparel, electronics, and household items.
- Customer benefit: Convenient access to affordable products for local communities.
E-commerce platforms:
- Website and mobile app: Walmart.com and the Walmart mobile app offer a seamless online shopping experience.
- Features: Customers can browse products, access personalised deals, and use services like home delivery and curbside pickup. Walmart partners with delivery platforms like DoorDash and uses its own fleet to offer same-day delivery for groceries and other essentials.
- Innovations: Walmart+ subscription service offers free delivery, discounts, and fuel savings.
Click-and-collect (BOPIS – Buy Online, Pick Up In Store):
- Overview: Customers shop online and pick up their orders at a designated Walmart location.
- Benefit: Combines online convenience with immediate access to goods.
- Feature: Expands product offerings without increasing inventory costs.

Question 3: Perform secondary research to determine whether Carrefour has adopted the principles of the triple bottom line concept, providing evidence to support your answer.

Carrefour has indeed adopted the principles of the triple bottom line (TBL) concept, which emphasises a balanced focus on economic, environmental, and social performance. The company’s commitment to these areas is evident through various initiatives and strategic frameworks.

Economic Performance:

Carrefour’s “Carrefour 2022” transformation plan, launched in 2018, aims to position the Group as a leader in the food transition for all, based on a sustainable and profitable growth model.

Environmental Performance:

Carrefour has implemented a Climate Plan targeting a 70% reduction in store emissions (scopes 1 and 2) by 2040, with an interim goal of a 50% reduction by 2030.

Social Performance:

The Carrefour Foundation focuses on fighting hunger and inequalities, promoting inclusion and diversity, and protecting the planet and biodiversity.