Everyone knows that Wal-Mart Stores Inc. is the biggest retailer in the world with annual sales of more than $485 billion. But the Bentonville, Ark.-based company is also a purveyor of interesting, fun, statistical facts that can make a data geek swoon.
While speaking to industry executives at the WWD Apparel and Retail CEO Summit, Jane Ewing, senior vice president of business development for Wal-Mart U.S., said 260 million customers walk through the doors of Wal-Mart each week. And it employs more than 2.7 million sales associates — 1.3 million in the U.S. alone, making it the largest private employer in America.
As the company grapples with the impact of higher wages for its hourly workers, an internal analysis by the retailer found that 75 percent of its current management team in the U.S. began their careers at Wal-Mart as an hourly employee.
Ewing said one-half of the U.S. population lives at least three miles from a Wal-Mart. And when it comes to sales of jeans, the company often sells enough denim — globally — in a month to stretch from the U.S.’s East Coast to the West Coast. On the produce aisle, Wal-Mart sells more than $1 billion worth of bananas each year, Ewing said.
There are other tidbits to consider, too. According to statisticsbrain.com, walmart.com had 3.5 million unique visitors to its Web site on Black Friday last year — well behind Amazon’s 7.7 million visitors, but much more than Best Buy’s 2.8 million.
If one breaks down Wal-Mart’s annual sales into micro pieces, the retailer generates $3 million in revenue — every seven seconds. And according to gobankingrates.com, the top three states with the greatest annual per capita spending at Wal-Mart are Oklahoma with $1,662; South Dakota with $1,511; and home state Arkansas with $1,494.