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Walmart and Delta have adopted VR for effective, immersive employee training, though high upfront costs may deter smaller companies.

Retailers invest in virtual reality, mobile apps, and AI to improve the customer experience: Walmart, Levi鈥檚, and Family Dollar are among the companies turning to tech to boost sales.

When it comes to retail memberships, Amazon is the leader, boasting 97.2 million household Amazon Prime members across the US, nearly three-quarters of the country鈥檚 total households, per our forecast. Taking a page from Amazon鈥檚 playbook, retailers like Walmart, Best Buy, and Target are using their own members-only sales events to build out their retail memberships.

Roblox wants to be an ecommerce platform: After a pilottesting physical goods sales with Walmart and E.l.f. Beauty, the gaming platform sees big potential in online sales.

Walmart enhanced its online marketplace with new capabilities and seller solutions, the retailer announced at its annual Walmart Marketplace Seller Summit this week. Updates include the addition of premium beauty products, expanded fulfillment services, and revamped seller solutions.

Amazon received 236.9 million unique US visitors in June 2024, according to Comscore. It far exceeded Walmart in second with 137.2 million unique visitors.

In August, brands got physical, with Olipop entering a new stadium, Nordstrom inking a deal with Rihanna, and Walmart growing with nonendemic retail media opportunities. Others took a more digital approach, making shopping more seamless on social media sites and AI-powered search. Here are the moves that made our analysts name eight brands to our unofficial most interesting list in August.

Both retailers used generative AI to improve employee productivity in Q2鈥�Walmart leveraged the tech to improve its product catalog and Target used it to enhance in-store employee tools. Target鈥檚 curbside pickup service helped it grow digital comparable sales 8.7% YoY, while Walmart鈥檚 marketplace and sales of GLP-1 drugs contributed to its 4.2% comp sales growth YoY.

The retail media landscape is dominated by national retailers like Amazon and Walmart, which boast the No. 1 and No. 2 retail media networks in the US by digital ad spend, per our forecast.

Walmart partners with Burger King to beef up Walmart+ perks: While the retailer focuses on appealing to its core customer base, Amazon makes a move for holiday and grocery sales.

The US consumer is holding up, according to Walmart: The retailer raised its full-year outlook after solid spending from value-seeking shoppers drove it to a Q2 earnings beat鈥攁lthough it warned of uncertainty heading into election season.

Walmart's ad business drives 26% revenue growth: Walmart Connect leads with 30% increase, outpacing Amazon's ad unit.

Walmart reversed its DEI policies in November 2024, while Target announced it would scale back its DEI programs in January. These reversals sparked significant consumer backlash, including a 24-hour economic blackout on February 28, a 40-day Target boycott in March, and a weeklong Walmart boycott in April.

The insight: Amazon weathered the February 28 economic boycott better than rival Walmart and delivery service Instacart, per Industry KPI online traffic data from MikMak. Amazon had a 32% share of online consumer shopping traffic from February 28 to March 2, up from 22.5% on February 27.

The news: Costco is pressuring its China suppliers to lower prices, the Financial Times reported鈥攋oining the likes of Walmart, Target, and Home Depot looking to shift the tariff burden onto manufacturers.

Walmart. Wayfair.

Streaming ads will enable Walmart to reach consumers beyond its website and stores, positioning it as a more competitive ad partner against Amazon and Google. The acquisition allows Walmart to build an in-house advertising and media platform, similar to Amazon鈥檚 Fire TV and Prime Video ad strategy.

Meanwhile, Walmart built out a whole marketplace called Walmart Discovered, where users can personalize their spaces, discover items, and also play games. Roblox itself has sought to make activations easy for brands, with a brand-focused landing page, and a partnership with PubMatic to help sell video advertisements. Creator partnership shift.

Amazon and Walmart show ads to virtually every shopper on virtually every search result page. Collectively, the two powerhouses claim over 80% of retail media ad spending; Amazon comprises three-quarters, and Walmart comes in at a distant second.

Walmart has the largest audience of any digital grocery platform. But our survey found that Amazon Fresh customers were more active and willing to try new products.

What this means for retail: The deal reflects the mainstreaming of BNPL, which is being embedded everywhere from delivery platforms like DoorDash to big-box retailers like Walmart to auto services providers like Tekmeric.

Walmart x Celebrity Moms: Walmart launched the 鈥淢oms Answer Moms鈥� TikTok series, where consumers could ask parenting questions to celebrity mothers like Paris Hilton and Whitney Cummings. The campaign鈥檚 top video amassed over 120 million views and sparked a 5,000-comment thread of mothers sharing advice. Empathetic marketing: Recognizing emotional complexity.