Walmart Store Changes: Cigarettes No Longer Sold At Some Stores

Walmart (WMT) will no longer sell cigarettes in some U.S. locations, following in the footsteps of a series of retailers that have pulled the products from their stores several years earlier.

According to sources for the Wall Street Journal, sales of tobacco products will end in some stores in California, Florida, Arkansas, and New Mexico, as the retail giant rolls out more self-checkouts and adds grab-and-go food and candy at the front of stores.

It was unclear at the time of writing how many of Walmart’s more than 4,700 U.S. stores would be affected by the decision.

A Walmart spokeswoman told the Journal, “We are always looking at ways to meet our customers’ needs while still operating an efficient business.”

The report from the Journal indicated that the decision from Walmart was in the works well before the COVID pandemic began – a direction that had come years earlier from Walmart Chief Executive Doug McMillon, without demanding the company formally do so.

Walmart superstores and other mixed retailers accounted for 14% of all U.S. cigarette sales volume in 2020, according to Euromonitor, as reported by the Journal.

Walmart trails a number of retailers that made the decision to pull tobacco products from their stores years ago.

Target eliminated tobacco sales in 1996 as profits on the products declined, while CVS yanked all sales of tobacco in 2014, citing a conflict with its focus as a healthcare provider despite a loss in annual revenue of $2 billion at the time.

In 2019, Walmart stopped selling tobacco products to people under 21 years of age prior to the law change. It has also stopped selling all e-cigarette products due to regulatory uncertainty around vaping.

Sam’s Club only sells tobacco products in fewer than 40 of its wholesale stores, a spokeswoman told the Journal.

The move by Walmart also helps to better align it with its healthcare goals as it moves further into the sector. Not only does it hold one of the largest pharmacies in the U.S., it purchased telehealth provider MeMD last year, is opening several primary-care clinics, and partnered with the federal government to administer COVID-19 shots to Americans.

As of Monday premarket hours, shares of Walmart were trading at $143.50, up 5 cents or 0.03%.