Great for you foods @ Walmart!!

Earlier this year Walmart announced its "Great for you" logo - a front of package labelling scheme to highlight products that meet certain nutritional criteria.  The scheme presently supports the Walmart Marketside and GreatValue branded products but you could see, with the pull that Walmart has, that they could easily get this label on to other branded products if the program proves successful.

In support of this program, they have now announced that they are offering a 5% discount on all "great for you" products.  This move further signals their commitment to the "healthy eating". 

At first glance this move doesn't seem too much different from the food rating systems nuval and guiding stars that are presently out there in the market.  As we've previously discussed, these solutions address the top slice of the healthy eating issue, but probably need a more personalized program to truly become ubiquitous.  

However, what we're seeing here from Walmart is something that could potentially be a game changer.  The difference is not so much in the specific details of the program but more in the holistic approach to the problem.  Following up their "great for you" food label program with this discount program is a signal of that.  If you also consider the investments in technology and in particular mobile that they have made over the recent past, it's not hard to see where they could take these programs in the future.

• Walmart investment in mobile
• Walmart investment in Social
• Walmart investment in E-commerce
• Walmart takes on Netflix
• Walmart launches online pay with cash
• Walmart launches Semantic product search

Whilst retailers are watching Amazon take market share with "show rooming" - Walmart is positioning to be a massive threat to the health and wellness grocer market.  It is definitely an evolution that we're going to be watching.