NPR shopped for 96 items at Walmart to track how prices are really changing

[mahatmakanejeeves]

Analysis Business
NPR shopped for 96 items at Walmart to track how prices are really changing

January 14, 2025 • 5:00 AM ET
By Alina Selyukh, Juweek Adolphe


This photo shows a shopping cart in a store aisle filled with groceries. The cart is filled with items including bagels, grapes, salmon and juice. The shelves lining the aisle are filled with bags of potato chips, candy and other packaged nonperishable foods.
NPR has tracked the prices of dozens of items at one Walmart in Georgia over multiple years.
Alina Selyukh/NPR

LIBERTY COUNTY, Ga. — Ask almost any shopper outside this sprawling Walmart southeast of Savannah, and they'll tell you about rising prices. ... "The meat is going up. Milk, eggs, everything is going up," says Cicely Gardner, rolling a cart with some doughnuts in the parking lot. ... But wait. The rate of inflation has cooled for two years, and not everything is going up in price. So why does paying at checkout still cause such heartburn? What gives?

NPR set off to answer that question at the most popular retailer in the United States. For six years, we have tracked the prices of dozens of items at this very Walmart superstore. And here's what we learned on our latest visit, in December. (Or skip the analysis to see the full details of NPR's shopping cart.)

On average, prices ticked up 0.7% last year

NPR's list includes 96 items from virtually every Walmart aisle: chips and veggies, shampoo and T-shirts, dog food and paper towels. To account for changes in package sizes, we focus on the price per unit, typically per ounce, whether it's toothpaste in a tube or soup in a can.

Over the course of 2024, the tracked prices on average increased just 0.7% — far less than overall annual inflation, which was 2.7% in November. (December's inflation data will be released on Wednesday.) ... That's because exactly half of our tracked prices stayed the same from December 2023 to December 2024 — a notable relief after the COVID-19 pandemic, when most prices jumped year to year because of turmoil in supply chains and labor markets.

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[PoindexterOglethorpe]

1. I personally never shop at Walmart.

In years past, when people would claim Walmart had the lowest prices, I'd drag them off to Albertson's for a price check.

Guess which was NEVER the cheapest.

[dpibel]

2. Does that change the conclusions of NPR?

There's been plenty of palaver on DU about how the Democrats fucked up by not acknowledging that prices have continued to skyrocket.

This article says that's not, in fact the case.

I'm not seeing the part about whether Wal-Mart is cheaper than Albertson's.

[PoindexterOglethorpe]

4. I have no idea of current WalMart prices.

Honestly, if I'm going to contribute to Republicans, I'll give money directly.

As I clearly stated, I compared prices between W and Albertson's several years ago. I have zero intention to double check at this point.

[dpibel]

6. Again, beside the point

The NPR article is not about what retailer is cheapest.

It is about the demonstrable fact that the claim that consumers were rightly angry with Biden because of skyrocketing prices is a false claim.

[ItsjustMe]

3. In my neighborhood

The Winco supermarket has far better prices than the Walmart.

[GreatGazoo]

5. Groceries are a very low margin business

A well run chain nets less than 1.5%. They loss leader (sell below cost) milk, bananas and other key items. WalMart leverages their position and can loss leader deeper than competitors because each visit to their store helps them sell non-grocery items. It was WalMart who forced food processors (Nestle, ConAgra, etc) to change the format of expiration dates so that customers could easily read them. They were semi coded before. The guess is that WalMart did this to put pressure on competitors who have less ability to rotate stock, eg are more likely to shelve product which is hitting the dates. All the grocery chains lose money on fruit and veg and that is why you see few or none of those in food "desert" areas.

It is an interesting study but the worst effects of inflation have come from increases in big ticket non-discretionaries like rents, property taxes, home/car/health insurance and medicine.

[PoindexterOglethorpe]

7. Plus, the fact that they only went to one store

and didn't comparison shop several, is annoying. WalMart, despite what a lot of people think, is not the end - all of shopping places.

Back nearly 40 years ago, when my kids were young, I'd occasionally buy clothes for them there. I noticed, in the late 80s, early 90s, that the quality had dropped considerably, and simply stopped going there.